Suvendu Adhikari Demands Electoral Roll Purge in Bengal, Cites One Crore ‘Illegal Voters’

Kolkata: West Bengal Leader of the Opposition and BJP heavyweight Suvendu Adhikari on Sunday stirred a new political storm by demanding a Bihar-style Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in West Bengal. Alleging large-scale presence of “Rohingya immigrants and Bangladeshi Muslim voters,” Adhikari claimed that nearly one crore illegal and bogus voters have found their way into the state’s electoral rolls.

Speaking during the BJP’s Kanya Suraksha Yatra in Howrah, Adhikari said, “There are close to one crore Rohingya immigrants, Bangladeshi Muslim voters, duplicate entries, deceased individuals, and fake voters in West Bengal. The Election Commission of India must act immediately and remove these names to preserve the integrity of our electoral system.”

He demanded that the Election Commission undertake an extensive revision exercise on the lines of what was recently carried out in Bihar. In that exercise, over 65 lakh names were deleted from the voter rolls ahead of the state elections, triggering massive political uproar.

According to official data, the total number of voters in Bihar stood at 7.89 crore as of June 24, 2025, while enumeration forms received by the Commission numbered 7.24 crore—suggesting significant discrepancies. The Opposition in Bihar accused the BJP-led government of manipulating the SIR to purge Muslim and backward caste voters, leading to widespread protests in both the state assembly and Parliament. Multiple legal challenges are now pending before the Supreme Court.

Despite the controversy in Bihar, Adhikari called for a similar drive in Bengal, alleging that Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress has “intentionally opened the gates” for illegal infiltrators for political gain.

“If you visit parts of North and South 24 Parganas, Murshidabad, Malda and Birbhum, you’ll see the changing demographic reality. This isn’t just migration—it’s a planned demographic aggression. If this trend continues, West Bengal will have to be renamed West Bangladesh. BJP will not allow that to happen,” he asserted.