The Election Commission of India (EC) has flagged large-scale anomalies in West Bengal’s electoral rolls during the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR), prompting a major verification drive across the state. Internal EC checks and officials working on progeny-mapping and digitisation have identified tens of lakh entries that appear doubtful including wrong names, improbable ages, mismatched photographs and apparent entries for deceased persons.
What the EC has found
EC sources and local election officials say the exercise has revealed multiple categories of concern:
About 30 lakh registrations have been identified as “questionable” during progeny mapping and other digital cross-checks entries that require physical verification because they do not reliably map to the older 2002 rolls or show suspicious metadata.
Separately, the EC reported that nearly 26 lakh names in the current rolls do not match entries in the 2002 voter lists when cross-checked a discrepancy that underpins much of the current verification work.
Officials in the CEO office have also recorded a large number of “uncollectible” forms and problematic records, one report put this figure at over 56 lakh entries flagged as uncollectible or otherwise problematic during data digitisation.
An earlier social media post circulating attribution to “ECI sources” warned that suspicious entries across categories could exceed 1 crore, a figure the Commission has not confirmed publicly but which has added urgency to on-ground verification.
How the verification is being carried out
The EC has been pushing Booth Level Officers (BLOs) to re-check paper forms, verify photographs and collect declarations from families where necessary. The BLO mobile app continually updated by the EC to add new verification checks (including duplicate detection and a BLO–BLA minutes feature) has itself become a flashpoint, with officials saying last-minute feature additions have complicated field operations.
To ensure independent supervision, the EC has also deployed senior officers as special observers to West Bengal and asked District Election Officers for clarifications where the data looks implausible (for example, booths reporting no dead or untraceable voters).
Political reactions and ground tensions
The revelations have sharpened political debate in the state. The BJP has accused local officials of large-scale “digitisation anomalies” and staged protests at the Chief Electoral Officer’s office, while the ruling Trinamool Congress has questioned the completeness of documents the EC uploaded and criticised the roll-comparison process. Both parties have urged the EC for transparency and speedy resolution.
Local BLO unions and field officers have complained about operational strain, warning that hurried updates to the BLO app and tight timelines are adding to confusion and errors. At the same time, the EC has underlined that the SIR exercise is designed to pick up exactly these kinds of anomalies and that physical verification is the legally sanctioned remedy.
What this means for voters and the coming polls
Electoral experts say detecting and cleaning such discrepancies is crucial for credible elections, but the scale of the anomalies if confirmed could delay finalisation of rolls or require further rounds of verification in affected districts. The EC has stressed that detection is the first step; names will be removed or corrected only after due process, which includes notice to affected electors and opportunities to rebut or confirm details.
For ordinary voters, the immediate impact is mixed: some may need to reconfirm their registration details at the booth or via Form 6/8/7 procedures; others may see temporary changes in online lists as the SIR progresses. The Commission has asked political parties, BLOs and local administrations to cooperate in completing verification before any lists are finalised.
EC’s next steps
The EC has signalled intensified field verification, expanded use of digital tools combined with paper-form crosschecks, and deployment of observers to districts with the largest anomalies. Officials say the focus will be on (a) progeny-mapping confirmations, (b) deleting or correcting genuinely duplicate or deceased entries after due notice, and (c) ensuring that voters who are eligible but not properly mapped can be added back following standard procedures.
