A Booth Level Officer (BLO) died of heart attack in Gujarat’s Kheda district on Thursday, with his family alleging “excessive work pressure” linked to the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls as the cause of his death.
Rameshbhai Parmar, 50, a resident of Jambudi village in Kapadvanj taluka of Kheda district and the principal of Navapura Primary School, died of heart attack in his sleep at his home during the intervening night of Tuesday and Wednesday, his brother Narendra Parmar told reporters.
He was working as a BLO for the last two weeks. Parmar’s family alleged that he had “excessive workload” due to the BLO work.
The Education Department said it is looking into the death of the school principal and that officials will visit the family.
A senior police official of Kheda district told The Indian Express that Parmar had a “natural death” and there was no probe initiated into the death as there had been no formal complaint from the family or the education department.
Speaking to The Indian Express, Parmar’s daughter Shilpa said that her father was “stressed” due to the BLO duty.
“My father had worked till late night to complete the entries on the electoral roll on Wednesday and did not wake up in the morning. For two weeks, he had been stressed due to the workload of the SIR as it required going about the task without break all day. He had returned home at his usual time of about 7 pm and then had tea in a hurry. He had not eaten all day due to work. He then rushed to my uncle’s place in another village to complete the data entry of the electoral roll… He had returned close to midnight and gone to bed. But he never woke up,” Shilpa said.
Shilpa added that his father used to travel about 90 kilometers by motorcycle every day to his school in Navapura and back from Jambudi.
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The family said that he was under stress due to the deadline pressure in BLO work. “There is some issue with the mobile network in our house and so he decided to go to my uncle’s place to make the data entry for the day… The exhaustion due to the extra workload took his life…” she said.
Kheda Paresh Vaghela, District Primary Education Officer (DPEO), told The Indian Express: “We also came to know through news reports that the teacher who was working as the BLO died of a heart attack. We have not received any formal complaint from the family about the excessive work pressure due to the BLO duty. As per the preliminary investigations, we have learnt that there is no postmortem report of the deceased as of yet. Still, the TPEO (Taluka Primary Education Officer) has been asked to look into the case and conduct an inquiry. Authorities will visit the family.”
Nearly 50,963 BLOs are working across the state for mapping 5.08 crore voters as a part of the SIR which was launched on November 4. Most of the BLOs in the state are school teachers.
Recently, several teacher bodies had objected to the additional work of BLO given to teachers. Calling the practice of issuing an arrest warrant for teachers missing the BLO work a ‘slavery practice’, the Akhil Bhartiya Rashtriya Shaikshik Mahasangh Gujarat, in a representation submitted to the state government, had also urged to stop issuing arrest warrants and ‘preserve the respect of teachers in the society’.
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The Congress has also been criticising the deployment of teachers as BLOs. Citing the recent Parakh Survey report, Gujarat Pradesh Congress Committee spokesperson Manish Doshi said that on one hand, the level of education in Gujarat has deteriorated as the state ‘is among the bottom 10 states’; on the other hand, 90 per cent of the BLO work in Gujarat has been assigned to teachers. “If they have to work for SIR after school, how much attention can those teachers give to the school? How will the level of education improve, or is education not a priority?” Doshi questioned.
Ritu Sharma is an Assistant Editor with The Indian Express' Gujarat bureau, an editorial position that reflects her experience and Authority in regional journalism. With over a decade of concentrated reporting experience, she is a highly Trustworthy and specialized journalist, especially noted for her Expertise in the education sector across Gujarat and previously Chandigarh.
Expertise
Primary Authority (Education): With over ten years of dedicated reporting on education in both Gujarat and Chandigarh, Ritu Sharma is a foremost authority on educational policy, institutional governance, and ground realities from "KG to PG." Her coverage includes:
Higher Education: In-depth scrutiny of top institutions like IIM-Ahmedabad (controversies over demolition/restoration of heritage architecture), IIT-Bombay (caste discrimination issues), and new initiatives like international branch campuses in GIFT City.
Schooling & Policy: Detailed coverage of government schemes (Gyan Sadhana School Voucher Scheme), the implementation and impact of the Right to Education (RTE) Act, teacher recruitment issues, and the impact of national policies like the NEP.
Student Welfare: Reporting on critical issues such as suicide allegations due to caste discrimination, and the challenges faced by students (e.g., non-delivery of NAMO tablets). ... Read More
Aditi Raja is an Assistant Editor with The Indian Express, stationed in Vadodara, Gujarat, with over 20 years in the field. She has been reporting from the region of Central Gujarat and Narmada district for this newspaper since 2013, which establishes her as a highly Authoritative and Trustworthy source on regional politics, administration, and critical socio-economic and environmental issues.
Expertise:
Core Authority & Specialization: Her reporting is characterized by a comprehensive grasp of the complex factors shaping Central Gujarat, which comprises a vast tribal population, including:
Politics and Administration: In-depth analysis of dynamics within factions of political parties and how it affects the affairs in the region, visits of national leaders making prominent statements, and government policy decisions impacting the population on ground.
Crucial Regional Projects: She consistently reports on the socio-economic and political impact of infrastructure projects in the region, especially the Statue of Unity, the Sardar Sarovar Project on the Narmada River, the Mumbai-Ahmedabad High Speed Rail bullet train project as well as the National Highway infrastructure.
Social Justice and Human Rights: Her reporting offers deep coverage of sensitive human-interest topics, including gender, crime, and tribal issues. Her reports cover legal proceedings from various district courts as well as the Gujarat High Court (e.g., the Bilkis Bano case remission, POCSO court orders, Public Interest Litigations), the plight of tribal communities, and broader social conflicts (e.g., Kheda flogging case).
Local Impact & Disaster Reporting: Excels in documenting the immediate impact of events on communities, such as the political and civic fallout of the Vadodara floods, the subsequent public anger, and the long-delayed river redevelopment projects, Harni Boat Tragedy, Air India crash, bringing out a blend of stories from the investigations as well as human emotions.
Special Interest Beat: She tracks incidents concerning Non-Resident Gujaratis (NRIs) including crime and legal battles abroad, issues of illegal immigration and deportations, as well as social events connecting the local Gujarati experience to the global diaspora. ... Read More
