Poll in Bengal or War on Bengal!?
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Sukla Sen
Apr 10, 2026, 6:23:55 AM (yesterday) Apr 10
to foil-l, Discussion list about emerging world social movement
Poll in Bengal or War on Bengal!?
Sukla Sen
Prelude
On April 6, having been directed by the Supreme Court, a very senior judge heading one of the nineteen tribunals, constituted by the Calcutta High Court, of retired HC judges to decide on appeals against the outcomes of the "adjudication" process pursuant to the SIR in West Bengal -- delivers a lightning swift judgement on the first and understandably one of the only two cases decided as yet. He has quite graciously restored the appellant's status as a rightful voter and consequently has also enabled him to contest in the coming poll as the Congress candidate from the Farakka constituency in Murshidabad.
Incidentally, the second case decided -- and decided in favour of the petitioner -- is also very much of the same nature. The appellant, a former MLA, is also a proposed Congress candidate from Ratua constituency in neighbouring Malda.[1]
To be sure, while both are Muslim neither is an ordinary voter.
Here is a somewhat longish excerpt from a news report giving out the essential features of the case:
Mehtab [Sheikh] is the first deleted Bengal voter cleared by a tribunal. None of the 19 tribunals has heard a single case except his so far, apparently because of “infrastructural issues”.
Mehtab’s circumstances as Congress nominee and wealthy contractor had allowed him to move the Supreme Court on April 2 and secure a directive to the tribunal to decide his case promptly, anpd (sic) to the Election Commission to cooperate fully.
Others may not be so fortunate, or privileged.
Poll panel sources said the judicial officers had decided 58 lakh among the 60.06 lakh “under adjudication” cases, and the rest would be done by Monday, April 6. They cited a 42 per cent rejection rate, which indicates about 25 lakh deletions.
April 6 is the last day for filing nominations for the first-phase seats, and April 9 for the second-phase seats. These are also the last dates for voter inclusion in the rolls for the respective phases.
...
Cleared by the tribunal, Mehtab can finally file his nomination on Monday — deadline day for his first-phase constituency.
“However, it remains uncertain whether the tribunals would be able to hear and dispose of all the appeals within whatever time is left, as they are yet to function fully,” a poll panel source said.
“Mehtab Sheikh’s case is an exception, having been heard following specific directions from the Supreme Court.”
Those deleted have 15 days to approach the tribunals. Filing the appeals is a complicated process. While no official figures are available, sources said tens of thousands of appeals had already been filed physically and online.
Mehtab had been issued a “logical discrepancy” notice because his father’s name on his documents didn’t match that on the benchmark 2002 rolls. At the scrutiny, he had furnished multiple documents that spelled his father’s name correctly.
But the preliminary “final” rolls of February 28 marked Mehtab “deleted”.[2]
This is undoubtedly very much an illustrative case of a single grain offering a fairly comprehensive view of the larger world.
The person in question, Mehtab Sheikh, is a wealthy contractor whose name had duly figured in the 2002 voter list. That should have been enough for getting included in the 2026 list produced by SIR. But, no! That was not to be. He was yet issued a "logical discrepancy” notice because his father’s name on his documents didn’t match that on the benchmark 2002 rolls. At the scrutiny, during "adjudication", he furnished multiple documents that spelled his father’s name correctly. Still his name was deleted.
As he could and did rush to the Supreme Court, the Court, presumably considering his status etc. and recognising the case as a grand opportunity to make a display of its "fairness" and "neutrality", made good use of it.The Calcutta High Court also got the cue and promptly signed on the dotted line.
While Sheikh's getting deleted from the voters list, in a visibly arbitrary and tyrannical manner, is pretty typical[3], what makes him (almost) unique is the alacrity with which the Supreme Court and the High Court acted in his case and thus got his name reinstated in the voter list. Barring just two, no one else of the 27 lakh rejected via "adjudication" is going to have that privilege. Consequently, out of a total of 60,06,675 individuals who were placed under "adjudication", (a mind-boggling?) 27,16,393, or 45.2%, are now determined ineligible to vote. Any favourable tribunal decision will make no change vis-a-vis the coming poll.[4]
War on Bengal
While the whole SIR project[5] being undertaken on the very eve of a poll and thereby planfully creating an alibi for some tearing hurry is a monstrous move to effect large-scale disenfranchisement -- most likely eventually leading to mass stripping of citizenship rights outright, as a sequel to the temporarily halted NRC[6] move -- Bengal, by now as clear as daylight, is a very special target!
The number of state officials summarily removed from their posts by the ECI is reportedly 21 times the number for all the four other states going to poll combined![7]
Similarly, some 2.4 lakh members of central paramilitary forces are being brought in to ensure "free and fair" polling! It's (much) more than double the number that we had during the preceding parliamentary and assembly polls.[8] The numbers for the other states must be just a small fraction.
Virtually being treated as an occupied enemy territory -- for the purpose of installing a puppet regime?
In Bihar, the first state where the SIR had its (sort of) trial run, there was no declared special category like "logical discrepancies".
It is during the second phase, this new category was manufactured. Even then, in the states other than Bengal, these cases were understandably rather few. For Bengal, the number was too huge -- 1.5 crore or so.[9] And thus arose a still newer category: "under adjudication" -- via the intervention of the Supreme Court. Just unique to Bengal. Over 60 lakh fell under this category.[10] Finally, some 27 lakh, from this category, stand deleted consequently effecting a total reduction of over 90 lakh or 11.85% of the total number of voters.[11] The last installment of 27 lakh+ for some "discrepancies" in name-spelling or such trivial grounds (largely a product of faulty algorithm used by the ECI?[12]) that should have nothing to do with determination of eligibility to vote as such.
Quite visibly, a massive state-organised pre-poll rigging exercise.
And the Supreme Court with a straight face observed what's the big deal if one cannot vote in one election? The voting right is not going to be extinguished forever![13]
In fact the CJI himself commented that while others are hardly making any noise, only Bengal is creating all the trouble[14] -- virtually echoing the noise emanating from the saffron camp in the social media in particular. Quite obviously just dismissing the fact that the Kerala assembly, on its part, had passed a resolution against SIR.[15] It also has approached the Supreme Court against SIR. In Tamil Nadu, a specially convened all-party meeting passed a resolution against SIR[16] and, pursuant to that, the ruling DMK approached the Supreme Court.[17]
Evidently, given the chaos (it has now come to light that the octogenarian grandson and granddaughter-in-law of the illustrator of the Indian Constitution, the legendary artist Nandalal Bose stand dropped from the final voter list -- despite producing all documents etc![18]), the most sensible approach would have been to ask the ECI to conduct the coming poll on the basis of the last, only recently updated, electoral roll and conclude the SIR exercise after duly settling all the complaints and objections in a fair and transparent manner -- within a reasonable timeframe.
And, now, the latest!
The impeachment motions against the CEC in both the houses of the parliament, initiated by the ruling party in West Bengal, submitted on March 12 2026 and signed by as many as 193 Opposition MPs (63 in Rajya Sabha, 130 in Lok Sabha) -- as per the laid down procedure -- stand rejected by the respective presiding officers (from the BJP of course) without indicating any specific ground![19]
Is this the height!?
Of course, the motions would have not been carried -- given the arithmetic. But, the grossly criminal wrongdoings of the ECI would have received some glare of publicity. Despite the godi media. That's why.
Implications
The implications and prospects are of course too dire.
I.The war on Bengal is, in fact, only a part -- albeit critical -- of the larger war, very much underway, on "India".
Not to forget, Bengal -- Rammohan Roy, Rabindranath Tagore, Subhash Chandra Bose and scores and scores of freedom fighters and intellect workers -- had played a very major role in conjuring up an "India" out of highly diverse communities, largely steeped deep in the darkness of cultural backwardness, living in contiguity over a fairly vast stretch of territory bound by seas and a high mountain range.
II. Even more alarmingly, closely behind this massive exercise in disenfranchisement, lurks the monstrous threat of NRC followed by stripping of citizenship and, maybe, detention camps -- as has already happened in Assam (on a trial scale?).[20]
That would be the final nail in the coffin of "India" -- embodying the ideal of egalitarian pluralism?
III. The way the foundational institutions of a parliamentary democracy -- meant to play the roles of its alert and conscientious sentinels -- just ganged up
as forces at the service of the regime very much engaged in hollowing out the very democratic essencce encrusted by the elaborate democratic structure that came up over the decades since Independence is also utterly striking.
Indian democracy now stands
reduced almost to the state of Putin's Russia.[21]
The process is very much underway.
However, a narrow window still remains.
That's the last hope and opportunity.
[In the above context may look up:
I. 'West Bengal: 2021 State Poll: The Shape of Things to Come' by Sukla Sen, Feb. 6 2021, at: https://groups.google.com/g/greenyouth/c/NtUv9OsTN2s/m/7KC_sXCLAAAJ
II. 'A Bid for Bengal ', a documentary film by Dwaipayan Banerjee and Kasturi Basu in 2021, at: https://avplayer.lib.berkeley.edu/Video-UCBOnly-MRC/(lib)a_bid_for_bengal___festival_screener.
Both pertain to the preceding assembly poll in West Bengal.]
Notes and References:
1. Ref.: 'West Bengal: Congress candidate makes it to rolls hrs before deadline for nomination' by Atri Mitra, April 7 2026, at:
2. 'Trials and tribulation: Wealthy Congress candidate clears SIR, implausible ask for lakhs' by Alamgir Hossain, April 6 2026, at:
3. I. 'Four more Bengal constituencies, same pattern: Muslims disproportionately marked ‘Under Adjudication’ in SIR' by Ankit Jain, April 7 2026, at:
II. 'Bengal SIR: 95% of deleted voters in Nandigram are Muslims, shows study' by Scroll Staff, April7 2026, at:
Also, for very significant scans of the tyrannical manner how SIR has been conducted in the state:
I. 'Bengal SIR: The wall ECI built around electoral data and how we broke through it' by Ankit Jain, April 3 2026, at:
II. 'How ECI Tailored the Voter Registration in West Bengal “As it Deemed Fit”' by Ayushi Kar, February 8 2026, at:
5. The SIR, an unprecedented move any whichever way, is structured to disenfranchise millions and millions -- the marginalised (and targeted) ones in particular by making near-impossible demands in terms of documents submission and that too within an absurdly tight time schedule.
On top of this, those who will be disenfranchised via this summary exercise will also face the nightmarish prospect of losing citizenship as well. Even if that process will presumably be a bit cumbersome.
Ref.: 'The SIR Underway: 'Supreme Court Bench headed by Justice Dhulia to hear Bihar electoral roll revision case on July 10 [today]'' by Sukla Sen, July 7 2025, at:
6. VIII. The real monster is the NRC, of which the NPR is the first, and most critical operational, part.
(Once the NPR is done, the NRC becomes almost the done thing.)
IX. The NRC operation makes vast sections of Indians, not in possession of documents related to ownership of ancestral land/house or such, extremely vulnerable to the threat - that the exercise overlies, of being stripped of citizenship.
That's too terrifying.
X. Needs be collectively and resolutely countered.
The role of the concerned state governments would be highly critical.
It's a battle one just doesn't afford to lose.
XI. Once the citizenship is lost - or even in the case of one's name not figuring in the preliminary list, one'd just be in a hellhole.
As plain as that.
XII. The whole exercise is meant to trigger a somewhat low-key civil war-like situation across religious divides.
In order to derive a big push towards a "Hindu Rashtra" (Hindu nation state) - at the very minimum, denuded of all vestiges of substantive democracy and pluralism.
The economy is sure to take a big hit. But, that's an acceptable price. From the viewpoint of the incumbent regime.
Ref: 'CAA: The Points to Note' by Sukla Sen, Dec. 21 2020, at:
7. 'EC transferred 483 officials in Bengal vs 23 in other poll states' by Harsh Yadav, April 2 2026, at:
8. 'Record 2.4 Lakh CAPF Personnel Deployed In Bengal Ahead Of Assembly Polls' by Ashwine Kumar Singh, Apri 3 2026, at:
9. 'EC publishes 1.5 crore voter names on list of ‘logical discrepancies’' by Atri Mitra, Jan. 25 2026, at:
10. '‘Under adjudication’: Why lakhs of voters in Bengal are in a race against time' by Damini Nath, March 16 2026, at:
11. 'SIR axe on 11.85% of Bengal voters: 27 lakh among 60 lakh names under adjudication removed' by Pranesh Sarkar, April 8 2026, at:
12. 'ECI misled the Supreme Court on SIR in West Bengal' by Ayushi Kar, Jan. 29 2026, at:
13. 'Exclusion from rolls doesn’t repeal voting rights forever, says Supreme Court' by Krishnadas Rajagopal, April 2 2026, at:
14. 'What West Bengal said in response to Supreme Court comment that SIR went smoothly in other States' by Debayan Roy, March 24 2026, at:
15. 'Kerala Assembly expresses concern over SIR, passes unanimous resolution' by The Hindu Bureau, Sep. 29 2025, at:
16. 'DMK-led all party meeting passes resolution to move SC against 2nd phase of SIR: MK Stalin', Nov. 25 2026, at:
17. 'DMK moves Supreme Court: Election Commission’s SIR under Fire', Nov. 4 2025 at:
18. 'Grandson of Nandalal Bose, artist who decorated India's Constitution, removed from Bengal voter list in SIR' by Anita Goswami, April 7 2026, at:
19. 'Rajya Sabha Chairman, Lok Sabha Speaker reject opposition bid to impeach CEC Gyanesh Kumar', April 7 2026, at:
20. 'SIR: How Assam's Disenfranchisement Model Has Reappeared in Bengal' by Angshuman Choudhury, Apr 6 2026, at:
21. The ruling anti-pluralist, Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Prime Minister Modi’s derailing of democracy include deteriorations in freedom of expression and independence of the media, harassments of journalists critical of the government, and attacks on civil society and the opposition. [...] 2024 is the first year since 2008 with no deteriorations on democracy levels for India but it remains an electoral autocracy since 2017.
Ref.: 'V-Dem Democracy Report 2025':
Also:
IMPORTANT: When the Supreme Court sounds like the executive, we have a problem. A constitutional court can’t become an executive court. SIR hearing is a prime example. Lost in a political point scoring in the courtroom is a stark reality: lakhs of bona fide INDIAN CITIZENS may lose their RIGHT TO VOTE. Case in point: the Constitution illustrator's grandson, his wife, no less, found themselves excluded from voter roll!
Ref.: https://x.com/i/status/2041363157843947995 on April 7 2026 by Rajdeep Sardesai.
Peace Is Doable
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