West Bengal Election Officials Face FIR Over Fictitious Voters; Voter Errors Reduced by 7 Million
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The Election Commission has taken a stern stance against four government officials and a data entry operator in West Bengal, directing district election officers to lodge FIRs against them for compromising electoral data security. The officials allegedly accepted fictitious voter applications and failed to verify them, while also providing unauthorized access to a central system used for electoral roll management. In a crackdown on electoral irregularities, the poll panel found that two Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) and two Assistant EROs had accepted a large number of Form 6 applications from alleged fictitious voters. The officers also allegedly failed to conduct the mandatory verification process, which led to the unauthorized users gaining access to the ERO Net system. Following an investigation, the Election Commission had suspended four officials, including two EROs and two Assistant EROs, and removed the data entry operator from election duty. However, FIRs were not lodged. The Election Commission has now directed the district election officers to lodge FIRs against the erring officials. Meanwhile, a senior official said that the number of voters with logical discrepancies in West Bengal has come down significantly, from 16.3 million to around 9.4 million, after scrutiny and removal of minor discrepancies such as errors in spellings.
