BLOs threatened to raise SIR progress from 60% to 75% in a day or face action

Amid the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR), Booth Level Officers (BLOs) said they are receiving notices threatening them with disciplinary action if their progress does not increase from 60% to 75% “in a day”.

The notices, issued by the Assistant Electoral Registration Officers (AEROs) on Monday, asked the BLOs to complete 75% of the enumeration work by Tuesday – within a day – or face disciplinary action.

“This is to inform you that you have already been trained on the SIR in several meetings. The progress of this day has been checked, and you have achieved less than 60% progress in the polling booths under your jurisdiction. Your progress has been checked every day by the District Collector and District Election Officer, and they have expressed strong objections, which show your negligence, irresponsibility and dereliction of duty. If you do not achieve 75% progress on Tuesday, you will have to appear in person and submit a report. If you do not, a report will be submitted to the superiors for disciplinary action against you,” the notice read.

The BLOs told The Hindu that while claims are being made that training was provided through various modes, they are false and the BLOs had not even given clear instructions on the basics of filling enumeration forms.

“How to digitise, link voters, or even tell whose names to fill in which section. Different instructions are given to all of us. When we check with our colleagues or department officials, they tell us something else. Our seniors say, ‘Watch YouTube tutorials’. There is no uniform response for anything,” a BLO said, arguing that they are working under “unimaginable stress”, with officials only pushing them to increase the distribution figures to show that exercise is going smoothly.

“The enumeration form requires the BLOs to declare that they have verified the 2002 electoral roll details. We have neither been trained nor do we have enough time to verify all of them because voters need time to fill the forms, and we need time to complete the procedure. Even though the deadline has been extended, officials continue to hurry us and ask us to repeatedly call voters to submit their forms early, while voters say they need more time. If we declare that we have verified the details without actually doing so, we will be held responsible,” a BLO said, pointing to the daily challenges they face.

“Officials keep pressuring us to distribute more forms and digitise more records but are ignorant of the problems people are facing on the ground. We are the ones going door-to-door, and people expect us to help them. What are we supposed to do in such a situation?” another BLO asked.

“Is increasing progress by 15% in a single day even practically possible? And what kind of mistakes will come up if we do so?” the BLOs asked.

They further pointed out that while they have been instructed to visit voters up to three times, even making one or two visits is proving difficult because of pressure from their seniors as well as Booth Level Agents (BLAs).

“The BLAs are supposed to accompany us as they have been appointed by political parties for this exercise, but they do not come. Instead, they keep pressuring us that nobody should be left out and that no issues should arise. We have written to officials at various levels highlighting the challenges, but nobody has paid any heed,” the BLOs added.