With the Election Commission of India initiating the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in Punjab from June 15 to remove discrepancies from electoral rolls ahead of future elections, chief electoral officer (CEO) Anindita Mitra on Friday held a meeting with representatives of political parties, and urged them to appoint booth level agents (BLAs) at the earliest.
The CEO stressed that timely deployment of BLAs will facilitate their training alongside Booth Level Officers (BLOs) from June 15 to June 24, following which they will conduct door-to-door visits from June 25 to July 24 for filling voter forms. The exercise will ensure inclusion of every eligible citizen in the electoral rolls and deletion of ineligible persons.
During the meeting, Congress leaders raised the issue of voters from other states, such as Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, also registered in Punjab’s electoral rolls. They also demanded that enumeration forms be made available in Punjabi, along with English and Hindi, to make the process more accessible and convenient for voters across the state.
Prominent among those present were Ferry Sofat from the Aam Aadmi Party, Avtar Singh Karimpuri from the Bahujan Samaj Party, NK Verma from the Bharatiya Janata Party, RL Modgill and Ranjit Singh from the Communist Party of India (Marxist), Amar Singh and Captain Sandeep Sandhu from the Indian National Congress, and Daljit Singh Cheema and Arshdeep Singh Kler from the Shiromani Akali Dal.
Representatives from registered and unrecognised political parties who attended the meeting included Major RPS Malhotra from Jai Jawan Jai Kisan Party, P Kumar from Nationalist Justice Party, Sucha Lal from Sacho Sach Party, Sukhdev Singh from Sada Punjab Sanjha Punjab Party, Jaswinder Singh from Samajik Sangharsh Party and Kushalpal Singh Mann from Shiromani Akali Dal (Amritsar).
