The Election Commission (EC) on Monday (December 8, 2025) appointed five senior IAS officers as Special Roll Observers (SROs) for different divisions in West Bengal. They will oversee the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.
According to the EC order, Kumar Ravi Kant Singh (IAS:2008:UP), Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Defence, has been posted to the Presidency division as SRO. Niraj Kumar Bansod (IAS:2008:CG), Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Home Affairs, has been appointed for the Medinipur division. Krishna Kumar Nirala (IAS:2005:CG), Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, will monitor the Burdwan division. Alok Tiwari (IAS:2007:UP), Joint Secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs, will work as SRO for the Malda division. Pankaj Yadav (IAS:2001:HY), Joint Secretary in the Department of Rural Development, has been deployed to the Jalpaiguri division.
This comes after the EC appointed retired IAS officer Subrata Gupta (IAS:1990:WB) as Special Roll Observer for the SIR, and set up a 12-member team of IAS officers as Electoral Roll Observers to support District Election Officers (DEOs) and Electoral Registration Officers (EROs).
Officials in the CEO’s office said the posting of SROs will help improve supervision, transparency and compliance with EC rules during the revision process.
The Special Intensive Revision started on November 4 with the distribution of enumeration forms and will continue till December 11. The draft rolls will be released on December 16, and the final voter list will be published on February 14, 2026.
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