Hundreds of Bengali-origin Muslim families evicted from their homes in Assam allege that their names have been struck off electoral rolls following a special revision, raising concerns about disenfranchisement ahead of upcoming elections, reported Scroll.
According to report, at least 5,700 people displaced by eviction drives in Dhubri and Golaghat districts may have been removed from voter lists. In Chirakutha Part I village in Dhubri’s Bilasipara constituency, 221 voters were deleted. Across four polling stations in the district, around 756 names were struck off. In Uriamghat in Golaghat district, 4,945 voters from five polling stations across 19 villages were removed after large-scale demolitions.
Millat Times could not independently verify the figures.
The deletions follow eviction drives carried out over the past year as part of a broader campaign by the government led by Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma to clear what it describes as encroached government and forest land. Over the past five years, around 50,000 people – most of them Muslims of Bengali origin – have been evicted, according to media reports. Sarma has previously said that individuals evicted from government land would be deleted from the voter lists of their former place of residence.
State election officials have denied any arbitrary removals. Assam’s Chief Electoral Officer Anurag Goel has said there were no “suo motu” deletions and that voters marked as “permanently shifted” due to eviction can apply for inclusion through Form 6 during summary revision or continuous updating of rolls.
On the ground, however, displaced residents say efforts to restore or transfer their names have met obstacles.
Bodiat Jamal, 42, whose home in Chirakutha was demolished in July to make way for a power project, told Scroll he discovered that his name and those of nine family members were removed from the final electoral roll. Jamal, who has voted in the constituency for more than two decades, now lives under a tarpaulin sheet on the site of his former home.
“Our homes were broken, land was taken away, and now even the voter card is gone,” he said.
Jamal, a mason who works in Upper Assam’s Dibrugarh district, said the absence of a valid voter identity card could jeopardise his ability to travel for work. He returned home after learning that a Form 7 objection – which allows a voter to seek deletion of another name – had been filed against him.
Habej Ali, 27, who relocated about 2 km within the same assembly constituency after his house was demolished, said he had filed Form 8 to notify authorities of his change of address. He later received notice that a Form 7 objection bearing his signature had been filed against him and his family members.
“I did not file any objection,” Ali was quoted by Scroll as saying. He added that officials advised him to apply as a new voter in a neighbouring constituency. “I am already a voter. Why should I apply again?”
Opposition parties in Assam have alleged that displaced voters are being excluded in a manner that could alter electoral balances in constituencies such as Bilasipara, where Hindu and Muslim populations are nearly equal. In a memorandum to the state’s election authorities, five parties claimed that genuine voters affected by evictions were being denied re-enrolment both online and offline.
For many families now living in temporary shelters after the demolitions, the uncertainty over their voting status has compounded the impact of losing their homes.
“We have been voting here for 24 years,” Jamal said. “This year, I may not be able to vote.”