West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee reiterated her claim that at least three to four people are dying by suicide every day in the state due to anxiety over the ongoing SIR exercise.
The special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls is underway in the state ahead of the assembly polls.
Addressing a programme at Red Road in Kolkata on the occasion of the birth anniversary of Subhas Chandra Bose on Friday, Banerjee asserted that the Election Commission and the central government must take responsibility for the deaths.
“More than 110 people have already died; every day, three to four people are dying by suicide out of SIR anxiety,” she said.
She also accused the BJP of conspiring against Bengal, claiming that icons of the country like Mahatma Gandhi, Rabindranath Tagore, Bose and B R Ambedkar were being insulted.
Banerjee also made the same claim on Thursday while inaugurating the 49th International Kolkata Book Fair.
Her 162nd book, a compilation of 26 poems on the agony people face due to the SIR exercise, was also released at the fair.
She claimed that scores of people, including elderly ones, have to line up at SIR camps for hearing, and wait for five to six hours in the open every day.
“Citing logical discrepancies, they (EC) are picking up issues like surnames of Bengalis which had been known and accepted for years,” the chief minister said.
“I am known as both Mamata Banerjee and Mamata Bandyopadhyay. In the same way, Chatterjee and Chattopadhyay are the same surname. Thakur also came to be known as Tagore during British rule,” she said, adding that had Rabindranath Tagore been around, he probably would have faced the same situation now.
Mamata Banerjee also noted that parents with multiple children are being asked to explain their age gaps, saying that elderly people are being asked to provide proof of birth.
“Our mothers cannot tell us their exact date of birth. Even (former Prime Minister Atal Bihari) Vajpayee ji had told me that 25 December is not his real birthday. I have Madhyamik papers to specify my date of birth. But there are many in the earlier generations who might not have it. Why harass them?” she said.
