Kolkata, 09 March (H.S.) : The All India Trinamool Congress has intensified its protest over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in West Bengal, with North Bengal Development Minister Udayan Guha launching a hunger strike in Dinhata on Monday.

The protest comes alongside the ongoing demonstration in Kolkata led by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who has accused authorities of arbitrarily deleting names from the voter list during the revision exercise.

Guha alleged that the Election Commission of India removed the names of ordinary voters from the electoral rolls under pressure from the Bharatiya Janata Party. In protest, leaders and workers of the Trinamool Congress began a mass hunger strike under his leadership in Dinhata.

He said the demonstration also aims to oppose the large number of voters whose names have been placed in the “under adjudication” category due to what he described as “logical discrepancies”.

According to Guha, more than 2.37 lakh voters in Cooch Behar district have been placed in the under-adjudication category.

He said while party leaders and workers are protesting in Kolkata under Mamata Banerjee’s leadership, a similar agitation has now begun in North Bengal through the hunger strike in Dinhata.

The minister further alleged that the Election Commission was acting at the behest of the BJP and that removing names from the voters’ list or placing them in a pending category was causing distress among ordinary citizens. He also criticised the Commission for not specifying when the pending list would be resolved.

Responding to allegations about the presence of Rohingyas and illegal infiltrators in the voter list, Guha said those found to be illegal migrants should be removed from the rolls and dealt with according to the law. However, he claimed that voter names were being systematically removed in areas where the BJP is politically weak.

When asked how long he intended to continue the hunger strike, Guha said he would continue the protest “as long as there is breath in my body.”

Notably, Mamata Banerjee began a sit-in protest in Kolkata last Friday, alleging that voter names were being arbitrarily removed during the SIR process, prompting the Trinamool Congress to launch protests across the state.

Hindusthan Samachar / Satya Prakash Singh