7 judicial officers held hostage as Malda villagers protest mass voter deletions
Telegraph | 2 April 2026
Seven judicial officers, including three women, were gheraoed and held hostage on Wednesday by villagers in Malda’s Kaliachak to protest against the mass deletions of names as part of the ongoing special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.
The judicial officers had not been freed when reports last came in late on Wednesday night. Local sources said that they had been held hostage for over nine hours with “no help forthcoming”.
“Seven judicial officers, including three women, remain gheraoed by protesters at Kaliachak II. No one is coming to rescue them despite complaints to Calcutta High Court and the local administration,” said an employee of the Malda district court around 11.50pm on Wednesday night.
This apart, widespread protests rocked several parts of Malda district on Wednesday, with demonstrators blocking national highways, state highways and key rural roads in at least five Assembly constituencies over the deletion of names.
Demonstrators blocked national and state highways and key rural roads in parts of Malda with a significant Muslim population on Wednesday to protest the “large-scale deletion” of names from the voter list.
Police and central forces cleared the blockades by evening, but protesters warned that agitations would resume till their names were reinstated.
In Englishbazar, over 500 residents of Amrity gram panchayat erected a bamboo barricade on the Malda-Manikchak state highway around 9.30am, disrupting traffic till late afternoon. A protest at Chandipur blocked the road connecting Malda town and Sattari for nearly two hours.
Sujapur saw around 1,000 residents blocking NH12. Carrying the Tricolour, they demanded inclusion of their names in the voter list.
Two journalists, including Somak Lahiri of ABP Ananda, were allegedly assaulted by protesters.
Sabina Yeasmin, the Trinamool candidate from Sujapur, met protesters at the Kaliachak-I block office.
Similar protests were staged along NH12 in Baishnabanagar, and Mothabari and Manikchak.
The Malda district has a 52 per cent Muslim population.
Sources said over 1.34 lakh out of 2.51 lakh voters in Sujapur, with nearly 90 per cent minority voters, were placed under adjudication. Supplementary lists showed many names were struck off.
At Mothabari and Baishnabanagar, around 79,000 and 68,000 voters, respectively, were marked under adjudication, but the supplementary lists, when they were published, showed that as many as 30 to 50 per cent of names were dropped.
“People’s names were deleted even though they submitted all documents during the hearings, said Md Najrul Islam, the Trinamool candidate from Mothabari.
Congress MP Isha Khan Choudhury said that of the 37,000-plus voters in Englishbazar and 65,000-plus in Manikchak who were placed under adjudication, many found their names missing when the supplementary lists were out. “Most of them are Muslims,” he said.
CPM leader Koushik Mishra claimed migrant workers and bidi workers were the worst hit by the SIR.
Contacted, Malda BJP’s Ajay Ganguly said that road blockades “won’t solve the issue”.
“The Election Commission has laid down a process. The affected persons should approach tribunals,” Ganguly said.
More blockades
In South 24-Parganas, residents of Brickfield in Hasnabad block, which is part of the Hingalganj Assembly constituency, staged a road blockade after 142 voters found their names deleted.
Kodalia residents under the Basirhat South Assembly seat also blocked the Taki Road after nearly 500 voters suffered the same fate.
Additional reporting by Subhasish Chaudhuri in Calcutta