Even as the ruling Trinamool Congress is all set to intensify its campaign against the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral roll, the Election Commission has maintained that the exercise is progressing smoothly and that the draft voters’ list will be published on December 16.
Based on the trend of digitising the collected enumeration forms till Monday evening, the ECI has estimated that around 43.30 lakh names will be excluded from the draft voters' list, reported IANS news agency.
The report further quoted officials in the poll panel as saying that the final number might increase once the digitisation process is completed.
Among those whose names will be excluded from the list, 21.45 lakh are dead voters, while the number of untraceable voters stands at around 5.5 lakh.
The number of voters identified as having shifted out of their registered address is around 15.10 lakh, while a little less than one lakh voters have been found to be bogus or fake voters.
"The number of untraceable voters might change since some are 'untraceable' as yet might be traced in due course," an official in the CEO's office told the news agency.
West Bengal has a total of 7,66,37,529 as of October 27.
Meanwhile, the Trinamool Congress has stepped up its anti-SIR offensive with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee set to address rallies in three border districts.
Banerjee will hold a rally in Malda on December 3, Murshidabad on December 4, and Cooch Behar on December 9. These politically sensitive districts have sizeable minority, migrant and displaced populations.
Last week, the Trinamool supremo had addressed a public meeting in Bongaon in the refugee-dominated Matua belt.
The ruling party in the state has termed the SIR a “completely unplanned, reckless and heartless” exercise, which, it said, has already led to the death of 40 people, including 17 Booth Level Officers.
On Friday, a delegation of Trinamool Congress MPs led by Derek O'Brien met Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar in Delhi to submit their grievances.
