Kolkata, Nov 23:The districts in West Bengal that have international borders with neighbouring Bangladesh witnessed maximum increase in the number of voters since 2002, the last time when the Special Intensive Revision was carried out in the state, the BJP claimed on Sunday, quoting data from the Election Commission of India (ECI).
BJP Information Technology Cell chief and the party’s central observer for West Bengal, Amit Malviya, issued a social media statement on Sunday morning, claiming that, according to ECI data, of the top 10 districts with the highest increase in voters, nine share a border with Bangladesh.
“Between 2002, when the SIR was last conducted by the Election Commission of India, and 2025, West Bengal has seen a 66 per cent increase in the number of registered voters – from 4.58 crore to 7.63 crore. ECI data shows that among the top 10 districts with the highest increase in voters, nine share a border with Bangladesh,” Malviya claimed in his social media post.
According to ECI data, added Malviya, the nine border districts that have seen the sharpest rise are: Uttar Dinajpur (105.49 per cent increase), Malda (94.58 per cent), Murshidabad (87.65 per cent), South 24 Parganas (83.30 per cent), Jalpaiguri (82.3 per cent), Cooch Behar (76.52 per cent), North 24 Parganas (72.18 per cent), Nadia (71.46 per cent) and Dakshin Dinajpur (70.94 per cent).
“The only non-border district in the top 10 is Birbhum (73.44 per cent). These infiltrators are now spread across Bengal and the rest of India, forming the core of Mamata Banerjee’s vote bank. This is why she is desperately trying to shield them,” he added.
The BJP leader said that CM Banerjee’s virulent opposition to the SIR was “no surprise”.
Trinamool Congress has been opposing the SIR, claiming that the exercise was an “indirect ploy” to impose the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in the state.
On the other hand, the BJP had been claiming that Trinamool Congress was opposing the SIR to “prevent” names of illegal Bangladeshi and Rohingya infiltrators getting deleted from the voters’ list, considering that they constitute its dedicated vote bank.
–IANS
