West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday claimed that the Bharatiya Janata Party may attempt to carry out a National Register of Citizens exercise “in the name of” conducting a special intensive revision of voter rolls in the state, The Indian Express reported.
She urged citizens in West Bengal not to give information to “unknown persons” who may ask them questions as part of the electoral roll revision exercise.
The Trinamool Congress has earlier also alleged that the revision of electoral rolls, proposed to be conducted nationwide, is a backdoor attempt to create a National Register of Citizens.
The National Register of Citizens is a proposed exercise to create a list of Indian citizens and to identify undocumented immigrants.
The register was updated in Assam in 2019, after a mammoth scrutiny of ancestral family documents to weed out “illegal immigrants”, and ended up excluding 19 lakh residents of the state. The updated list, however, has not been notified six years on.
On Thursday, both Mamata Banerjee and her nephew, party General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee, reiterated the claim about the revision of electoral rolls at the foundation day event of the Trinamool Congress Chhatra Parishad, The Indian Express reported.
Mamata Banerjee asserted that she would not allow even one name to be deleted from West Bengal’s voter rolls. She claimed that the Bharatiya Janata Party had “brought over 500 teams” to West Bengal to carry out surveys for omitting the names of voters.
Earlier this month, the Trinamool Congress chief had warned West Bengal residents against filling any Election Commission form related to the voter roll revision without “knowing the details”.
Elections are scheduled to be held in West Bengal in March-April 2026.
A special intensive revision of the electoral rolls is underway in Bihar, where those whose names were not on the 2003 voter list are required to submit proof of their eligibility to vote.
Voters born before July 1, 1987, must show proof of their date and place of birth, while those born between July 1, 1987, and December 2, 2004, must also submit documents establishing the date and place of birth of one of their parents. Those born after December 2, 2004, will need proof of date of birth for themselves and both parents.
Several opposition parties have expressed concern that the exercise could disenfranchise large numbers of voters.
Also read: Why EC move to create new Bihar voter list has rung the ‘NRC’ alarm bell
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