West Bengal Election: How SIR deletions raise fears beyond voting rights in Murshidabad – a ground report

Samserganj, Murshidabad: Mobarak Hossain is a ward member in Chachanda gram panchayat under the Samserganj Assembly constituency in Murshidabad, nearly 280 kilometres north of Kolkata, along the eastern bank of the Bhagirathi river near the India-Bangladesh border.

In the days leading up to an Assembly election, Hossain, 50, would typically be immersed in campaigning across his ancestral village. But on the afternoon of 17 April, five days before the assembly polls, the scene is strikingly different. Seated inside his ceramic tile shop, Hossain watches as his staff handles a customer purchasing tiles in bulk.

Hossain is engaged in an entirely different task today. Surrounded by a small group of people, he is examining a stack of documents — both physical and digital. Hossain’s attention was fixed not on the election trail, but on paperwork that, for now, seemed to matter far more to him and lakhs of deleted voters like him in West Bengal ahead of the polls.

“People would celebrate elections in Samserganj and Murshidabad like Eid. But today, as you see, there are no loudspeakers, no campaign in our village. Most of the people here are fighting a battle to somehow get their names in the voter list,” says Hossain, whose name has been deleted from the voter list along with over 90 lakhs across West Bengal during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise conducted by the Election Commission of India.

Samserganj worst-affected seat in SIR deletions

District-wise data released by the Election Commission last month showed that Murshidabad recorded the highest number of deletions across poll-bound West Bengal, with a total of 4,55,137 names removed. Samserganj, where 74,775 names have been deleted, is the worst-affected of the 22 assembly seats of Murshidabad.

A walk through the lanes and bylanes of Samserganj reveals that almost every household has a voter who has been deleted. Hossain’s family is one of them, though he is the only member affected.

West Bengal votes in two phases. All 22 districts of Murshidabad and 12 seats in adjoining Malda – both districts with a considerable Muslim population – are voting today. The second phase on 29 April. Results would be declared on 4 May.

32 per cent deletions

The ward number 200 in Chachanda gram panchayat of Samserganj, which Hossain represents, has seen 715 voters deleted from the 1416 names before SIR began.

Overall, the Samserganj seat saw 32 per cent deletions compared to the pre-adjudication voter list. At least 200 of 247 booths in Samserganj have deletion rates higher than the state average, according to analyses of EC data by various independent organisations.

Booth no 106 is the worst-affected booth in Samserganj with over 60 per cent deletion in its 1,361 pre-SIR votes, according to Samiul Islam, who teaches at a government high school after studying political science at Jadavpur University in Kolkata.

“Here, nobody is asking who will win. The only query is who made it to the voter list,” Islam told this reporter at Basudebpur village.

91 Lakh voters deleted in West Bengal

Overall, 91 lakh names have been deleted from West Bengal's voter list since the SIR began. The state's voters have shrunk almost 12 per cent, from 7.66 crore electors in October 2025 to 6.75 crore now. West Bengal had 7.34 crore eligible voters in the 2021 assembly elections.

Around seven lakh new voters have been added to West Bengal electoral rolls ahead of the assembly elections, with the Election Commission yet to disclose the age or gender break-up of this additional electorate, officials told news agency PTI on 18 April. The commission, however, did not specify how many among these new entrants are first-time voters who have just turned 18, nor has it given a detailed gender breakdown of these voters.

The Election Commission conducted the SIR in 13 states and Union Territories. In West Bengal, however, it's different with the introduction of ‘adjudication’ and ‘logical discrepancies.’

A deleted voter must apply to have their name included on the list within 15 days of rejection. Offline appeals are submitted at the DEO office, which forwards them to the tribunals for hearing. On 17 April, the Supreme Court ruled that individuals cleared by appellate tribunals can vote in the upcoming polls. The court directed the ECI to issue supplementary rolls with cut-off dates of 21 April and 27 April for the two polling phases.

But on the ground, the delayed establishment of these tribunals for lakhs of cases makes it virtually impossible for voters of Samserganj to get their names added to the voter list.

Fate hangs in the balance

Miles away from Chachanda village, Md Alauddin also sits with a group of people struggling to find their names in the voter list ahead of the 23 April poll day. Alauddin, who contested the 2021 assembly polls from Samserganj seat as a candidate of Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI), said his name, along with seven others from his 9-member family, still remains in the ‘under adjudication’ category.

“I have been calling BLO. Even he doesn’t know how to deal with this case. Our voting rights hang in the balance,” Allaudin tells this reporter.

There are some families where all names have been struck from the rolls. The family of Tariq-ul-Alam is one of them. In a copy of the letter submitted to their local Electoral Registration Officer (ERO), the reason for Alam’s ‘adjudication’ status is that he is “linked with someone, who is claimed by 6 others as parent.”

“We are five brothers. One of the brothers is married. Names of all brothers, the sister-in-law and our father have been put in the‘adjudication’ category and we do not know how to deal with this,” says Alam, who lives in Tinpakuriya village of Samserganj.

Biggest question on the minds – what next?

As voting day nears, the fear in Samserganj and other adjoining seats in Murshidabad is certainly not just about losing a vote. Most of those whose names have been deleted fear the worst is yet to come – a question on their citizenship.

"Our greatest fear is the BJP’s ‘detect, delete and deport’ warning. Who knows, next we could be sent to detention camps or told to go to Bangladesh,” says Hossain, sipping tea from a mud cup at his shop in Chachanda village.

All political parties in West Bengal, except the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), have opposed the SIR. The EC has called it an exercise to clean up the voter list. The BJP, on its part, insists that the process was a drive to sanitise the electoral rolls and remove ‘illegal infiltrators’ from Bangladesh and the Rohingyas.

"For years, the TMC protected fake voters because they wanted votes, not verification. Genuine citizens have nothing to fear. But those who entered illegally and remained on the rolls through political patronage cannot stay forever," Samserganj BJP leader Shashi Charan Ghosh, who contested the 2021 assembly polls, told news agency PTI.

‘Abnormal Growth in voters’

The BJP has been arguing that the abnormal growth in the voter list was fuelled by illegal migrants from Bangladesh. Between 2011 and 2016, more than 41,000 voters were added in Samserganj. Between 2016 and 2021, another 41,000 were added, according to news agency PTI.

Murshidabad Member of Parliament (MP) Abu Taher Khan, however, accused the BJP of ‘implementing NRC through the back door.’

"This is political targeting. Look at the names disappearing -- from Muslim villages, poor people, women and migrant families whose sons work outside Bengal. The BJP knows it cannot defeat us politically in Murshidabad, so it wants to delete voters before the election itself," Khan, TMC leader, told PTI, alleging that the deletions were concentrated in areas where the TMC had secured massive leads in 2021.

Experts said in many seats of Murshidabad, a swing of even 10,000 to 15,000 votes can alter the poll outcome. In Samserganj alone, the number of deleted names (74,775) is nearly three times the margin of victory in the last assembly election.

Samsergang has been a TMC seat since 2016. Amirul Islam, the sitting TMC MLA, won with a margin of about 26,000 votes, defeating Congress party's Ziadur Rahman in the 2021 assembly polls. By the way, Anwara Begam, wife of Islam, has also been deleted from the voter list, according to locals.

This year, TMC has fielded Noor Alam, while the BJP has fielded Shashi Charan Ghosh from here. Nazme Alam is a Congress candidate from here.

‘Our names are etched in its records’

“It’s not just about a vote. Choosing not to vote is one thing. But removing your name from the list is another. It is like you chose to fast, but that doesn’t mean you are allowed to die with hunger,” Sabir Ahamed, founder of SABAR Institute, a research organisation that has been analysing SIR numbers, tells Mint in Kolkata.

Back in Samsergaj, unlike in the past, this election is not just about who wins or loses. It is more about identity and protecting the basic democratic right.

“Our forefathers lived and died on this land. Our names are etched in its records - land, passports, etc. Our votes have been counted for decades. The soil itself bears witness that we belong here," Hossain tells this reporter, days before the 23 April poll day in Murshidabad.