Political Parties' Booth Agents Absent in Delhi Voter Roll Revision, Causing Low Awareness
Four days into the door-to-door special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Delhi, booth-level agents (BLAs) appointed by political parties to assist electors and ensure transparency are largely missing on the ground, resulting in low awareness among residents about the ongoing exercise.
The month-long revision exercise, which began on June 30, is underway across 13,033 polling booths in the 70 Assembly constituencies of Delhi. So far, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has appointed 12,809 BLAs across the city, the Congress 10,698, and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) 9,290.
BLAs are appointed by recognized political parties to spread awareness, assist citizens in filling out enumeration forms, and improve transparency by ensuring that genuine voters are not deleted from the rolls. The Election Commission encourages parties to appoint a BLA for every polling booth.
During visits to various districts, including Central, New Delhi, East, West, South, and North West Delhi, reporters found that as Booth Level Officers (BLOs) spent much of their time explaining the exercise, locating voters’ names in electoral rolls, and helping people fill enumeration forms, many said BLAs had either not contacted them or were yet to become active.
BLAs are allowed to fill up to 50 enumeration forms per day on behalf of residents before publication of the draft electoral roll and 10 forms per day thereafter, as well as assist in finding names in previous SIR rolls.
When contacted, the BJP and Congress said they had imparted organizational-level training and deployed BLAs across the city to extend support to voters and BLOs, helping them find documents, identify dead, shifted, and duplicate voters, and locate voters who might get “wrongfully deleted.” AAP did not respond.
‘No contact yet’
A BLO in an urban village in Mehrauli said BLAs had been appointed for only one political party across the area’s nine polling booths, but none had contacted election officials. “One of them himself was not aware of the process. I filled out his form,” the officer said.
“People come with only their voter ID and Aadhaar card, and give it to us. They don’t know what is going on. And we don’t have the luxury to sit them through the entire process; neither are they educated enough to find their names in the previous rolls. We have to do it ourselves by asking them whatever they know,” they added.
In that urban village, the BLO, after distributing the forms door-to-door, has been sitting at a local office, setting up a camp, to help residents fill their forms.
Among those waiting for clarity was Kanti Devi, 39, who thought she could get forms to enrol her children as voters, both now above 18 years of age. A native of Bihar, she said her own name had been deleted after she was marked as a shifted voter during a revision there. She was informed briefly by the BLO to return a few days later to collect the desired forms, as this was not the right time.
BLOs in areas of the Malviya Nagar constituency echoed the concern: “If BLAs simply create awareness, residents will know what is happening. That alone will speed up the process.”
In one area in Mehrauli, the only BLA appointed, who works as a cab driver, said, “If I stay here all day, I will lose all my work.”
The situation, however, was different at a polling booth in Rohini, where a BLO credited an active BLA for making the process smoother. “The BLA has been helping spread awareness, going door-to-door with me and identifying electors who have shifted or died,” the officer said. At the same time, another party BLA for the same booth in the area had not contacted her or residents, while around 10 neighbouring booths also reported little or no BLA presence.
Training for BLAs was also imparted by the Delhi CEO office in the run-up to the SIR. “BLAs are not officially mandated to do anything from our end. Our BLOs are present to assist the residents in any way they need. But it is encouraged by the EC so that there is transparency in the process,” a CEO official said.
