4 more Bengal poll officials face ECI ire over data safety breach

In West Bengal, the Election Commission of India (ECI), the chief electoral office and district magistrates are conducting regular checks to identify irregularities in the electoral rolls, people in the know told ET.

The ECI is yet to begin the special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in the state, which goes to polls next year.

The move comes after irregularities were spotted in the electoral rolls, leading to a tussle between the ECI and the state government.

Meanwhile, the West Bengal chief electoral office has named four more officials--two assistant electoral registration officers and two electoral registration officers (EROs)--in Rajarhat-Gopalpur area near Kolkata and East Midnapore district's Nandakumar for violating data security norms, sources told ET.

On Wednesday, the ECI summoned chief secretary Manoj Pant to New Delhi for clarifications over irregularities and asked him to take action against the erring officials by August 21.

The West Bengal chief electoral office said irregularities like the ones for which Pant was summoned, have been detected in Rajarhat-Gopalpur and Nandakumar.

During the document verification process, the EROs approve or reject after checking supporting documents and cross verification. In an earlier case and this one, too, fake documents were allegedly uploaded, people in the know said.

On August 5, the ECI had directed the chief secretary to suspend two EROs and two AEROs for "grave lapses" and "failing to perform their duties" for violating the policy of data security by sharing their login credentials of the electoral roll database with unauthorised persons.