Bengal CEO tells Mamata govt to immediately appoint ERO and AERO in state

Kolkata, Aug 27 West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Manoj Kumar Agarwal has written a letter to the state Chief Secretary Manoj Pant regarding the appointment of Electoral Registration Officer (ERO) and Assistant Electoral Registration Officer (AERO) in the state. In the letter, the CEO requested for immediate action on the appointment of ERO and AERO.

The move from the CEO came after Election Commission of India (ECI) repeatedly asked the CEO office in West Bengal to submit a report on Assembly constituency-based appointment of ERO and AERO.

Recently, the ECI once again wrote to the CEO office in this regard. The CEO office has been asked to submit an effective report on filling up the vacancies including ERO, AERO. The Commission has been ordered to submit the report by 5 pm on August 29.

As a result, the CEO wrote to state chief secretary on Wednesday asking the state government to fill the vacancies quickly.

It is learnt that till now, 15 to 16 vacancies are pending for the post of ERO and there are more than 500 vacancies for the post of AERO.

Sources said the appointment of ERO and AERO ate crucial for Election Commission to conduct Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of West Bengal's voter's list.

Following the implementation of SIR in Bihar, there are speculation that a similar exercise will be carried out in Bengal as well. According to the election commission sources, the SIR will start first in five states of the country and that list includes Bengal.

According to the commission sources, the SIR will be done first in the states which will go to Assembly polls in 2026. Assembly elections are scheduled to be held in five states next year -- Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Puducherry, Assam and West Bengal.

It may be noted that recently West Bengal government partially complied with the ECI directive by suspending four officials -- two Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) and two Assistant Electoral Registration Officers (AEROs) of Moyna and Baruipur Purba Assembly Constituencies for alleged voter list malpractices. However, the state government has not lodged FIRs against the officials as mandated by the ECI.

The deadline for full compliance was August 21.

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