No dead, duplicate voters at 2,208 booths, EC seeks report2,208 booths complete work with zero ‘uncollectable’ form
Times of India | 2 December 2025
Kolkata: Two-thousand-two-hundred-and-eight polling booths in Bengal where 100% SIR forms have been distributed, collected, and digitised by BLOs are now under EC scrutiny. The EC has asked reports from these booths by 10 am on Tuesday.
With the digitisation of enumeration forms entering its final stage, the EC on Monday sought reports from the district election officers (DEOs), who are also DMs, within 24 hours after identifying 7,844 booths where digitisation of all enumeration forms was completed with 0-10 ‘uncollectable' forms.
According to a senior EC official, of these 7,844 booths, 2,208 have been identified with zero ‘uncollectable' form. This means all the distributed forms have been digitised without mentioning any forms belonging to deceased, duplicate, permanently shifted, and untraceable voters.
"It is very unnatural that in such a large number of booths, no ‘uncollectable' form was found. In all such 2,208 polling booths, after 100% digitisation of enumeration forms was done, the EC identified this phenomenon. The EC has sought a report signed by EROs and countersigned by DEOs for these booths by 10 am on Tuesday," the official said on Monday.
At the other 5,636 polling booths, the number of such forms varies between 1 and 10. For all these polling stations, the commission has sought a report from the DEOs by Tuesday.
"The EC has instructed the DEOs to recheck the whole SIR exercise in these polling booths thoroughly and submit a report to the CEO, West Bengal, who will send it to Nirvachan Sadan. The EC has identified these polling stations from its system where all the enumeration data are being uploaded," another EC official elaborated.
Among the 2,208 booths, South 24 Parganas has the maximum — 760 booths. It is followed by Purulia, Murshidabad, Malda, Nadia, and Bankura with 228, 226, 216, 130, and 101 booths, respectively. For Howrah, North 24 Parganas, Hooghly, and Kolkata North, the numbers are 94, 82, 54, and 1, respectively. In Kolkata South, no booth has been identified with zero ‘uncollectable' forms so far, EC sources added.
At 542 polling stations, only one ‘uncollectable' form was received. There are another 420 polling stations where the number of ‘uncollectable' forms is only 2.
At 372 polling booths, the number is three. There are 374 and 481 polling stations with the number of ‘uncollectable' forms at as 4 and 5, respectively.