For years, the BJP and RSS have been uniting Hindu voters by spreading fear of Bangladeshi, Rohingya and Nepali infiltrators. The SIR campaign was launched in Bihar with the same slogan. The purpose of the SIR was said to be to catch foreign infiltrators, but what did the final report reveal? After removing voters and adding new ones, the final voter list released on October 1 left 7.42 lakh crore voters, which was 7.89 crore during the Lok Sabha elections. Out of the 52.9 lakh names removed, 22.34 lakh are deceased, 36.44 lakh are migrants (within the country), 6.85 lakh are duplicates and only 11,484 are unknown. There are no nominations of Nepalis, Bangladeshis and Rohingyas. Should those who are not found be considered infiltrators?
The Chief Election Commissioner claims that after 22 years, Bihar’s voter list has been cleaned. A prestigious organization called ‘The Reporters Collective’ said in its report released on October 6 that the list has fake or suspicious addresses of 1.32 crore voters and 14.35 lakh are duplicates. In 3.42 lakh cases, the name, father’s name and age are the same. People from different castes are registered at the same address. Political analysts are calling it an ‘election scam’, while opposition parties are calling it a conspiracy by the government. Statistics show that the list has been further tainted in the name of cleaning. The BJP-JD(U) alliance, which has been ruling Bihar for almost 20 years, has not been able to find any infiltrators. Therefore, this question seems reasonable: What was the real purpose of the SIR? The government, which has failed to create industrial development and employment in Bihar, hatched the SIR conspiracy to distract the people so that the names of voters supporting other parties would be crossed out, but the opposition parties fought a strong fight on the streets and in the Supreme Court, largely thwarting this conspiracy. The case is still pending in the Supreme Court and it is hoped that the ‘unknown voters’ shown by the Election Commission will also be found.
