Kolkata: The Election Commission of India (ECI) has directed that digitisation of voter details collected during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in West Bengal be completed by the end of November.
Officials said the process, based on enumeration forms gathered by booth-level officers, is already underway, with around 50 lakh forms digitised so far. The pace of work is expected to accelerate from Sunday to meet the deadline.
West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer Manoj Kumar Agarwal set the target during an urgent meeting with District Magistrates and electoral officers on Saturday evening, attended virtually by senior ECI officials from New Delhi.
Meanwhile, a four-member central ECI team will visit West Bengal from November 18 to 21 to review progress. The delegation, led by Deputy Election Commissioner Gyanesh Bharti, will also include principal secretaries S B Joshi and Malay Mallick, and deputy secretary Abhinav Agarwal. They are scheduled to assess the SIR in Kolkata, South 24 Parganas, Nadia, Murshidabad and Malda.
This marks the second visit by a central team this month, underscoring the commission’s focus on the exercise. Earlier, Bharti led a three-day review in North Bengal following the launch of the SIR on November 4.
The revision is being conducted in three stages, with the first stage already in progress. The entire process is expected to conclude by March next year. The last SIR in West Bengal was carried out in 2002.
(Inputs from IANS)