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Journalism of Courage
The Gautam Buddha Nagar district magistrate, who is also the election officer of the district, on Wednesday ordered that the salary of three electoral registration officers (ERO) and 12 assistant electoral registration officers (AERO) will be withheld for allegedly “failing” to visit the number of houses they were scheduled to cover each day under the special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, which commenced on Tuesday.
According to a statement issued by the district authorities, the DM has also recommended that an FIR be lodged against 130 booth level officers (BLO) and 13 supervisors “over the lapses”. Their salaries will also be withheld pending further action.
As part of SIR, these officers are to make door-to-door visits across 12 states and Union territories to verify and update electoral rolls.
Additional District Magistrate (Finance and Revenue) and Deputy District Election Officer Atul Kumar told The Indian Express, “The action was taken after the desired results were not obtained… action was taken against the three sub-divisional magistrates and other assistant level officers after the booth level officers failed to cover the pre-decided number of houses per day.”
“We have to cover nearly 18 lakh houses in a month and therefore, we decided that 50 of them will be covered by each BLO in a day. Rest everything was done on time… forms were printed and given to BLOs. They had to distribute the same and they failed,” he added.
According to the statement, the action was taken at a review meeting of the SIR exercise held on Wednesday. “During the review meeting, it was found that in several Assembly constituencies, EROs, AEROs, BLOs and supervisors had failed to collect and process enumeration forms from tehsils in a timely manner, thereby delaying the crucial voter list revision process.”
It added that taking serious note of this “lapse”, the district election officer withheld the salaries of three EROs and 12 AEROs. In addition, FIRs have been recommended against 130 BLOs and 13 supervisors, whose salaries have also been stopped.
The Election Commission of India has set January 1, 2026 as the qualifying date for SIR, and the process of distribution and collection of enumeration forms is scheduled to be conducted between November 4 and December 4. Rationalisation and re-arrangement of polling stations will also be completed by December 4, and the preparation of the draft electoral roll will be held between December 5 and 8. The draft electoral roll is set to be published on December 9, following which voters will have the opportunity to file objections.
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