After Bengal Administration’s Failure, ECI to Identify Housing Complexes for Polling Booths

KOLKATA:
The Election Commission of India (ECI) has now decided to apply its own independent mechanism for identifying housing complexes with multiple towers for setting up polling booths for the forthcoming Assembly elections in the state.

The ECI has decided the matter amid the failure of the District Magistrates (DMs), also the District Electoral Officers (DEOs), to identify housing complexes with 300 voters or above for setting up the polling booth, sources in the office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), West Bengal, said.

“The DMs, also the DEOs, have failed to meet two consecutive deadlines for furnishing the list of identified housing complexes to the Commission. December 31 was the last deadline, and even then, the lists have not been furnished by the DEOs. Hence, the Commission had decided to apply its own independent mechanism to identify housing complexes for setting up polling booths for the 2026 West Bengal Assembly elections. The Commission will specify the detailed plans on this count very soon,” a CEO’s office insider said.

He further said that in the eventuality of the owner’s associations not permitting the setting up of polling booths within the housing complexes, then the ECI might set up temporary polling booths and other related arrangements at any place nearest to the housing complexes.

“In that case, the temporary polling booths would be set up at such a place which would cater to voters residing in more than one housing complex adjacent to each other,” the sources said.

As per the ECI’s plans as of now, such polling booths within the housing complexes will mainly be in the state capital of Kolkata, its adjacent townships in the North 24 Parganas, South 24 Parganas, and Howrah districts, industrial townships of Asansol and Durgapur in West Burdwan district, and Siliguri in Darjeeling district.

On Wednesday, a delegation of Trinamool Congress MPs met the Chief Election Commissioner, Gyanesh Kumar, highlighting the party’s grievances on the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in the state.

During the meeting, the CEC made it clear that there was no question for the ECI to backtrack from its earlier decision to set up polling booths within housing complexes.