The case of the missing voters of Asansol’s railway colonies
The Statesman | 8 December 2025
As much as 60 per cent of the approximately 33,000 voters in the railway colonies of Asansol North Assembly constituency are missing. This is the conclusion that 30 Booth Level Officers entrusted with the enumeration of residents at 30 booths in these colonies are surmising following the SIR process started over a month ago.
With only four days left to submit the enumeration forms, the BLOs, many of who have made repeated enquiries about the whereabouts of these untraced voters, do not hold hope of them surfacing and their forms being uploaded. They therefore have slim chances of their names being included in the draft voters’ list.
The main reasons behind their “disappearance” are suspected to be their passing away or their shifting to a new place of residence in a different constituency after their superannuation from the railway services. There was a time some decades ago when most of these railway government quarters remained full. Nowadays, the number of railway employees in the Asansol division has come down, reducing the occupancy rate in these quarters.
In Booth number 139 near the railway’s heritage Vivekananda Institute (erstwhile Durand Institute), only 243 voters’ names have been digitised out of a total of 931. Likewise in Booth number 142 of Eastern Railway Girl’s School, the names of 129 voters of a total of 219 have been uploaded. In Booth number 265 at the same school, the names of 707 voters out of a total of 1,230 voters have been submitted.
According to the Election Commission of India’s SIR process and rules, the concerned BLOs have visited these quarters more than three times and served the enumeration forms either by passing them under the doors or fixing them on the door latches in the absence of anyone answering knocks. But so far, the BLOs have not received filled up forms from them.
As the situation stands, it appears that the names of about 1,300 voters are likely to be deleted from three booths alone. The situation is quite similar in other booths of the old and new railway colonies in Asansol. The houses or residential addresses of three voters and their families have been found demolished in Booth number 139.
The local councillor of Asansol Municipal Corporation is worried that such huge numbers of voters in the railway colonies of Asansol North are missing during the SIR form distribution.
The Asansol Junction Station was inaugurated in 1964, and had become India’s biggest industrial link in 1887. Asansol Division of Eastern Railway was established in 1925, and is now one of the oldest divisions in the Indian Railways. It has always been in the forefront
of operations, both freight and passenger. As far as Eastern Railway is concerned, Asansol Division is referred to as the heart of
operations, being at the crossroads of the Grand Chord route via Gaya and the mainline route via Patna.
Several railway colonies and a number of reputed century-old Christian missionary schools were set up on railway land situated on both
sides of the railway tracks which bisect Asansol town. People from all over the country and abroad used to live in these
colonies, among them a large number of Anglo-Indians who started to migrate elsewhere from the 1990s.