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New Delhi, Oct 28 (IANS) The Election Commission of India (ECI) has launched the second phase of Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of voter lists in 12 states and union territories, including Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Kerala and Puducherry. The move is aimed at ensuring cleaner and more accurate voter lists. Reacting to the development, leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Janata Dal (United) have welcomed the initiative, calling it a necessary step to weed out fake and duplicate voters. Leader of Opposition in the West Bengal Assembly, Suvendu Adhikari, told IANS, “Fake voters should be removed. This is not a new exercise – the voter list has been amended eight times since independence. Such amendments should continue to ensure that elections are held with clean and accurate voter lists.” BJP leader Kapil Dev Aggarwal said, “The way the SIR results have come out in Bihar, the truth has come out. Despite repeated objections by Rahul Gandhi, Mamata Banerjee and others and allegations of ‘vote theft’, their claims have been proven baseless. If the Election Commission conducts the SIR survey to stop fake voting and eliminate fake voters, we fully welcome it. No political party should have such objections. Needed.” Transparent exercise.” Expressing similar views, BJP leader and Karnataka MLC CT Ravi said, “This amendment is necessary. I have learned that names of some Bangladeshi citizens have been included in the list. Bringing voters from Italy or Pakistan is not acceptable in Indian democracy. Our Constitution does not allow such irregularities.” Pointing out the discrepancies in voter data, BJP leader Chandrashekhar Bawankule said, “In the voter lists, new names are often added, but deletions are rarely done. Unless the Election Commission undertakes door-to-door verification and seeks legal support where necessary, the lists will remain inaccurate. In my constituency, there are 5,40,000 voters, whereas ideally there should be around 2,50,000. Many people have moved to suburban areas in the area, yet their names remain at both places. ECI’s SIR initiative will ultimately help in correcting such errors. I congratulate the Commission for taking action on this long standing demand.” Another BJP leader TS Srivatsa also lauded the move, saying, “We welcome this decision. This will benefit all parties equally. Genuine voters will not face any problem, while fake voters will be identified and removed.” Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Vishnu Dev Sai said, “This is a commendable step. We welcome the Election Commission’s decision and hope that the SIR process will be implemented effectively.” JD(U) leader Rajeev Ranjan Prasad supported the pan-India rollout of SIR 2.0, saying, “SIR was successfully conducted in Bihar to ensure transparency and fair voting. ECI’s renewed efforts for clean and accurate voter lists is a welcome step. No eligible voter should be left out.” Briefing the media about the voter verification exercise, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar on Monday congratulated polling officials as well as voters for the successful SIR in Bihar and explained in detail the process and rationale for conducting ‘purification drives’ from time to time. The CEC said that since independence, SIR in the country has been conducted 8 times between 1951 and 2004 and the last one was in 2004. He said political parties have been repeatedly insisting on voter verification to ensure that only legitimate voters participate in the electoral process. He said it is necessary to clean the voter list after every few years due to reasons like voter duplication, deletion of names of people who have either died or have permanently moved out of the election state. –IANS JK/Mr