Kolkata: The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of West Bengal’s electoral rolls has escalated into a severe administrative crisis, with the relentless workload on Booth Level Officers (BLOs) resulting in severe consequences. The situation reached a breaking point in Nadia district with the death of Rinku Tarafdar, a 52-year-old para-teacher and BLO.

Tarafdar, a para-teacher by profession and BLO for Booth 201 in Nadia’s Chapra assembly constituency, was found hanging in her rented home on Saturday morning. Her suicide note lay beside her body.

“The Election Commission is responsible for my death. I have never been involved in politics. My family is financially stable. But I cannot bear the inhuman pressure for such a minor job. I am mentally shattered,” she wrote, exposing the extreme distress felt by thousands of BLOs statewide.

This incident came barely days after another BLO in North Bengal allegedly died by suicide under similar circumstances earlier this week, fuelling fears that the SIR cycle is pushing field-level workers to breaking point. 

As anger spread, political reactions came swiftly. West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee expressed her outrage in a Facebook post, writing: “How many more lives will be lost? How many more need to die for this SIR? How many more dead bodies shall we see for this process? This has become truly alarming now!!”

Her condemnation set the tone for a day of sharp criticism directed at the Election Commission. 

Soon after, Krishnanagar MP Mahua Moitra launched an equally fierce attack, alleging, “The Chief Election Commissioner Jignesh Kumar is a murderer. He is directly responsible for this death. Their reckless decisions are costing lives. Over 26 people have died in Bengal. SIR has happened before, but never with such brutality.”

Her criticism added fuel to an already explosive situation in which BLOs across West Bengal are reporting unbearable workloads. Many say they are being forced to distribute hundreds of forms daily, then digitally upload them despite repeated server failures and poor technical infrastructure. 

The political backlash is growing across party lines. 

Condemning the pressure on BLOs, CPI(M) state secretary Mohammed Salim said, “Untrained BLOs are being crushed between the Election Commission’s workload and ruling party pressures. We have written to them demanding that BLOs should not be forced to upload more than 50 forms daily. But the commission is silent.”

The BJP, meanwhile, questioned procedural lapses. Nadia district BJP spokesperson Sandeep Majumdar said, “The suicide is unfortunate. But can a para-teacher be made a BLO? That is the State Election Commission’s decision – so who is responsible? And how did a suicide note that should have been with the police end up with a Trinamool MP?”

In Hooghly’s Pandua, BLO Sumita Mukhopadhyay broke down in a viral video after being labelled a “low performer” for digitising 300 out of 1300 forms. She said she was summoned to the BDO office, made to sit for hours without food, and ignored even when she fell ill. 

“I sat from 11:30 am to 4:30 pm without food. The server wasn’t working. My body was failing; I felt like ending my life. No one helped. I am being harassed. I can’t take this anymore,” she said, adding that the commission “has no proper plan, keeps changing decisions, and does not understand the hardships of BLOs. This is not just my story – many are facing this," she said in her post

Despite the ongoing crisis, the Election Commission, on Saturday, reported that 99.74% of West Bengal’s 7.66 crore voters had received enumeration forms by Saturday evening, leaving a backlog of only two lakh. However, the digitisation process lags behind, with officials noting that only 41.2% (approx. 3.15 crore) of these forms have been uploaded.

With the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) window, spanning November 4 to December 4, closing rapidly, the Commission has aggressively pushed for speed, even issuing show-cause notices last week to staff deemed “slow.” Consequently, with only days remaining, BLOs remain trapped in a high-stakes environment, squeezed between the commission’s rigid targets and intense local political pressure.

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