Kolkata: The Election Commission of India (ECI) has decided that the voters from three “aboriginal tribes” or “primitive tribes” will be automatically enlisted in the final voters’ list of West Bengal.
The voters from these three communities will not be required to furnish any document for that purpose.
Sources in the office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), West Bengal, said that these “aboriginal tribes” or “primitive tribes”, whose voters will be automatically enlisted in the final voters’ list without furnishing any supporting identity documents, are Birhor, Toto, and Sabar.
Following the Commission’s instruction, the District Magistrates, as well as the District Electoral Officers, have asked the Block Development Officers (BDOs) to provide details of the voters from these three aboriginal tribes in their respective areas.
“In case any voter from any of these three aboriginal tribes does not have the scheduled tribe certificate, the district administration will issue him or her the certificate on an emergency basis,” sources in the CEO’s office said.
Earlier, this week, the ECI had announced special relaxations for sex workers, people from transgender or other communities and declared monks in connection with the identity proof-related formalities to be followed at the ongoing hearing sessions on the claims and objections on the draft voters’ list in West Bengal, which is the second stage of the three-stage Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in the state.
The Commission had decided not to be stringent about the authenticity of the supporting identity documents required for establishing their voting rights, as in the cases of regular categories of voters.
For sex workers and people from the transgender communities, the relaxations are being done since a majority of that section are social outcasts and family outcasts, and they do not own their original documents to prove their authenticity as genuine voters as Indian citizens.
In the case of the people from the transgender community, pointed out by the CEO’s office sources, there is an additional problem of three major mismatches between their original documents and their present documents, namely name mismatch, look mismatch, and, most importantly, gender mismatch.
In case of monks, there are name mismatches due to their pre-monk and post-monk life, and hence they would also be extended this special relaxation in connection with the identity proof documents.
