SIR: Not debate, but radicalisation of perception leads to tragedy in West Bengal

New Delhi, Nov 1 (IANS) What was supposed to be an on-ground verification and update of electors in poll-bound states has turned into a major controversy with rumour mills and echo chambers raking up a citizenship controversy, leading to panic and the tragic death by suicide of at least three people in West Bengal.

Leaders of the state’s ruling Trinamool Congress, including Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, have blamed the Election Commission of India (ECI) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for the atmosphere of fear. They have likened the process of Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the voter list to the National Register of Citizens (NRC). However, the ECI is not authorised to remove or include any citizen, but it will only determine voting rights.

In case of a complaint, there is scope for appeal as well.

Nonetheless, even the Congress and the Left have been questioning the motive of the poll body over its timing and method, alleging it to be in collusion with the BJP. They continue to drum up tensions while blaming the BJP for “doing politics” of fear, division, and hate.

The TMC has threatened protests and legal action, saying it will create help desks and organise mass demonstrations if genuine voters are deleted during SIR.

Incidentally, the Supreme Court is already hearing petitions over SIR, but has not stopped the exercise.

BJP leaders have forcefully denied the charge that SIR is a “backdoor NRC” and have accused the TMC of stoking fear for political gain. Party spokespersons described the linkage of suicides to a national administrative exercise as a manufactured narrative and pushed back against what they called false or politicised claims.

However, some state unit leaders initially took an aggressive stand, claiming that SIR would weed out several thousand fake voters in the state. Each of these positions has transmitted preferentially into sympathetic networks. For supporters of TMC, the dominant takeaway is victimisation and threat; for BJP supporters, it is panic-as-politics; for undecided or isolated citizens, the noise is disorienting rather than informative. The net effect is not debate, but radicalisation of perception. Many citizens, especially elderly people or those without adequate documents, are vulnerable to repeated alarms over statelessness, grief, and anxiety, and resort to the extreme step.

Citing such traumas, political echo chambers have tragically amplified the deaths to raise more panic. Family members of the victims, according to media reports, are themselves sometimes divided on the actual cause of suicide.

In fact, Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the voter list has already been done eight times from 1951 till 2004, with the last exercise being conducted more than two decades back, in 2002-2004. Since then, many changes in electoral rolls have occurred due to frequent migration that may result in voters getting registered at more than one place, non-removal of the names of the deceased, or the wrongful inclusion of someone not a citizen of India.

Article 326 of the Indian Constitution establishes that elections to the Lok Sabha and to State Legislative Assemblies shall be based on adult suffrage. This means that the right to vote in these elections lies with an elector who has to be a citizen of India… of at least 18 years of age, and not disqualified by law. Yet, the target for many Opposition parties is the citizen aspect, where they claim that the SIR of electoral rolls is aimed at removing the names of voters not inclined to support the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Meanwhile, with the announcement of the SIR rollout in West Bengal, there were reports that household helps in several parts of North 24 Parganas were quitting their jobs. The reports quoted some families saying that their domestic helpers have returned to Bangladesh. This raises questions over their sudden disappearance – was it fear of alleged victimisation or actual identification?

--IANS

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