Bengal polls: Uncertainty clouds today’s release of ECI’s 1st supplementary list of judicial adjudication cases

Kolkata, March 20 (IANS) Despite the Election Commission of India (ECI) having decided to release the first supplementary list of voters whose cases were submitted for judicial adjudication on Friday, uncertainty persists over the action.

The earlier decision of the ECI was that the first supplementary list would be published on Friday on the basis of the judicial adjudication process completed by the night of March 19. However, an insider from the office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), West Bengal, said that the possibility of the list being released later in the day cannot be fully ruled out; it will, however, depend on certain factors.

A total of 60,06,675 cases were referred for judicial adjudication after the voters concerned were identified under the logical discrepancy category, and as per statistics provided by the CEO’s office, the process was completed for 25.34 lakh cases till the night of March 19.

“The detailed booth-specific reports on this count are already available with the ECI. But some booth-specific reports are yet to arrive at the Commission. If the reports from these remaining booths are available in the course of the day, then only the first supplementary list will be published on Friday,” said the CEO’s office insider.

The CEO’s office source added that another factor that the ECI is keeping in mind before publishing the first supplementary list is the security of the 732 judicial officers, including 100 each from neighbouring Jharkhand and Odisha. Apprehension is that tension might flare up in certain pockets of the state over the deleted names during the judicial adjudication process.

The ECI has already directed the police administration to review the security provided to judicial officers, identify lapses, if any, and take corrective measures accordingly. “If anyone needs additional security after the additional list is published, arrangements will be made,” the CEO’s office insider said.

It is learnt that almost 34 per cent of the names for which the judicial adjudication process had been completed are excludable.

Already, the Supreme Court has ruled that those voters whose names would be deleted during the judicial adjudication process would have the opportunity to move to the Appellate Tribunals.

The two-phase polling in the state will be on April 23 and April 29. In the first phase, polling for 152 Assembly constituencies will be held, and in the second phase, the remaining 142 seats will have voting.

–IANS

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