Ek BLO Ki Maut: Mounting Deaths Underscore Dark Reality of SIR Process

More BLOs have died in BJP-ruled states than in those governed by Opposition parties, writes Arati Jerath.

A leading TV news channel has compiled a list and calculated that at least 33 BLOs have died since the exercise began in November.

(Photo: Aroop Mishra/The Quint)

In a democracy, even one death due to the pressure of official work should be a cause for concern. Yet, the Election Commission of India (ECI) and the Narendra Modi government seem to have decided to turn a blind eye to a rash of unexplained deaths of Block Level Officers (BLOs) conducting the ECI-mandated Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls across 12 states and union territories.

Reports of BLO deaths are scattered so no centralised figure is available. However, a leading TV news channel has compiled a list, and they calculated that at least 33 BLOs have died since the exercise began in November.

Some officers have left behind heart-rending suicide notes, blaming their deaths on SIR-related stress. Others have simply collapsed from heart attacks and other causes brought on by the tension and strain of meeting unrealistic deadlines in an environment of high pressure.

SIR Has Taken a Dark Turn

Officialdom’s intransigence on the issue is evident in the government’s point-blank refusal to allow any discussion on SIR and the attendant deaths in the ongoing winter session of Parliament. After days of ruckus by Opposition MPs, the government side-stepped the issue by proposing a debate next week on the larger issue of electoral reforms, but only after a discussion on 150 years of Vande Mataram.

It is not clear whether the Opposition has agreed to this attempt at obfuscation. However, it is determined not to let go of the SIR issue without getting answers even if it means daily pandemonium in Parliament.

The reasons for the government’s evasiveness are obvious. Going by media reports, more BLOs have died in BJP-ruled states than in those governed by Opposition parties. Although West Bengal is in the spotlight because Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress (TMC) boss Mamata Banerjee has made SIR the center-piece of her campaign for next year’s Assembly elections, available data shows that the ECI’s exercise has taken a far darker turn in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.

Not Just in West Bengal

At least nine BLOs are reported to have died in Madhya Pradesh (MP) and seven in Uttar Pradesh (UP). As against this, the figure in West Bengal is six. Not only is the death toll disturbing, the SIR exercise seems to be creating havoc on the ground in these two BJP-ruled states. TV channels have shown video grabs of sobbing officers crying about not being able to take the pressure anymore.

In some areas in these states, there has been outright rebellion by stressed-out BLOs. The Noida administration has registered 60 FIRs against BLOs and seven supervisors for alleged negligence and disobedience, while in Bahraich, two BLOs were suspended for misconduct. Elsewhere in UP, a school teacher resigned from her job in sheer frustration, saying she could not devote adequate time to either the SIR work assigned to her or to teaching her students.

In MP, the BJP government was forced on the backfoot after it was found that four assistants appointed to help BLOs to complete the SIR exercise on time were BJP members. They were hastily removed, leaving those BLOs without backup to lessen the pressure of work.

In BJP-ruled Rajasthan, too, schoolteachers are up in arms because they are being made to do SIR work in addition to their educational assignments. In fact, many have lodged official complaints about their increased workload. They say they are putting in 12-18 hours a day to complete the electoral rolls revision within the short time frame laid down by the ECI, while simultaneously not allowing their primary jobs as teachers to suffer.

The irony is when a TMC delegation met the full bench of the Election Commission recently to ask for reconsideration of the exercise, ECI officials blamed Mamata Banerjee’s government for making "baseless allegations".

Apparently, in response to the TMC’s dramatic statement that the ECI has blood on its hands, the Commission hit back to suggest that the party and state government were to blame for BLOs deaths, not the SIR. This is the line being parroted by the BJP too.

During a recent TV debate, party spokesperson Zafar Islam accused the TMC in as many words of intimidating and harassing BLOs and obstructing the SIR process.

The EC has now written to West Bengal Election Commission officials and state police to ensure that BLOs are not subject to undue political pressure and threats.

Misplaced Priorities

Outside Parliament last week, BJP leaders extolled the "purity" of the SIR process. But clearly, there is a dark side to the exercise which needs to be highlighted, discussed and probed.

If indeed BLOs are feeling so pressurised that they are killing themselves, something is wrong. At the very least, there should be a sympathetic discussion in Parliament to draw public attention to the plight of BLOs across the country.

Why should an electoral rolls revision, which has been done so many times in the past, lead to suicides and deaths? The public needs answers and the relatives of the victims need closure. But first, those in authority who came up with the idea of conducting a labour-intensive exercise in a truncated time-frame must open their eyes to the havoc that has been unleashed on the ground.

(Arati R Jerath is a Delhi-based senior journalist. She tweets @AratiJ. This is an opinion piece, and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)