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The Deadly Deadline: “I Can’t Do This Anymore”—India’s electoral revision turns into a graveyard for BLOs/teachers

From consuming poison in Uttar Pradesh to hanging in West Bengal, the ‘Deadly Deadline’ of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) triggers a suicide wave among teachers and Anganwadi workers, employees’ unions cry ‘institutional murder’ while families mourn loved ones broken by state pressure

The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, currently underway across 12 states and Union Territories, is causing immense pressure and hardship for the administrative personnel tasked with its execution. Started as a specific distress signal from Booth Level Officers (BLOs) in the West Bengal has rapidly escalated into a nationwide humanitarian crisis for these foot soldiers of the electoral process. Essentially, the demanding nature and workload of the SIR are figuratively “grinding” the BLOs into dust, highlighting a severe and growing administrative issue.

The Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls—a mandated verification drive by the Election Commission of India (ECI)—has left a trail of devastation across the states, turning the routine bureaucratic exercise of updating voter lists into a lethal trap for civil servants.

While the Election Commission insists the drive is necessary to “purify” voter lists and ensure the integrity of the electoral process, the teachers, Anganwadi workers, and clerical staff forced to execute the order on the ground are collapsing. They are buckling under what they describe as “inhuman” pressure, squeezed between an unforgiving digital system, aggressive supervisors, and an impoverished public. From suicide notes addressed to orphaned children in Tamil Nadu to teachers collapsing in classrooms in Gujarat, the narrative is no longer about updating rolls; it is about the ultimate cost of a vote.

The tragedy is not just in the statistics, though the rising frequency of suicides is terrifying; it is in the methodology of the despair. In less than three weeks, a harrowing pattern has emerged, a deadline is set, a threat of suspension is issued, a worker begs for relief, the relief is denied, and a family is left to mourn. The “Deadly Deadline” has become a silent killer, stalking the corridors of government schools and block offices across the nation.

Gujarat

On Friday, November 21, 2025, a government teacher in Gujarat named Arvind committed suicide in Gir Somnath. He was serving as a Booth Level Officer (BLO) for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. His death immediately highlighted the severe pressure faced by the teaching community. The extreme workload to meet enumeration targets had become overwhelming. Arvind did not die silently, leaving a brief suicide note that explained his final act. The note, as reported by the New Indian Express, carried the harrowing message: “I can’t do this SIR work anymore…”

This single sentence stripped away the bureaucratic jargon of “efficiency” and “targets,” exposing the human fragility underneath.

The crisis in Vadodara further highlighted that this “deadly deadline” causes not just psychological snaps, but physical collapse. On November 22, Ushaben, an Assistant BLO and ITI employee, died while on duty at a school.

According to The Wire Hindi, Ushaben collapsed and died on the spot. The tragedy is compounded by the fact that her family had already raised red flags about her health. Her husband, Indra Singh Solanki, stated that the family had “already warned officials” about her deteriorating health, pleading for her exemption. Yet, the machine required a cog, and she was deployed for SIR duty regardless.

“Ushaben was deployed on BLO duty despite poor health,” the family had alerted the authorities

A pall of concern has descended following the suspicious death of yet another Booth Level Officer (BLO), Dinkal, a 26-year-old technical assistant with the Surat Municipal Corporation. Dinkal was discovered unconscious in her bathroom and, despite efforts to save her, was later pronounced dead at a private hospital.

These incidents raise serious questions about the lack of medical consideration for the staff forced into these high-intensity field roles, where they must walk kilometres in the heat, face hostile voters, and then return home to perform hours of data entry.

West Bengal

The West Bengal continues to see the highest concentration of fatalities. The death toll among BLOs in the state continues to climb, with new incidents reported in the Nadia district, bringing the total in the state to five within this short window.

On November 19, a 48-year-old Anganwadi worker, Shantimoni Ekka was found hanging in the courtyard of her home. Her death revealed the systemic cruelty of the process; she was a Hindi speaker in a Bengali administrative zone, tasked with processing complex legal forms she could not understand.

Similarly, on November 21, Rinku Tarafdar, a para-teacher assigned to BLO duty, allegedly died by suicide due to similar work pressure. The gravity of the situation forced the Election Commission to seek a report from the District Magistrate regarding her death. In the Chapra constituency, a 52-year-old BLO was found dead, with The Hindu reporting her family’s assertion that she was “under immense mental duress regarding the filing of enumeration forms.”

The relentless accumulation of bodies has turned the SIR exercise into a political flashpoint in Bengal. The ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) has lashed out at the Election Commission, describing the deaths as a result of “inhuman workload,” echoing the sentiment of workers who feel they are “left with no choice but death.”

Mamata Banerjee, Chief Minister of West Bengal, expressed on ‘X’ (formerly Twitter) that “Profoundly shocked to know of the death of yet another BLO, a lady para- teacher, who has committed suicide at Krishnanagar today. BLO of part number 201 of AC 82 Chapra, Smt. Rinku Tarafdar, has blamed ECI in her suicide note (copy is attached herewith) before committing suicide at her residence today.

How many more lives will be lost?

How many more need to die for this SIR?

How many more dead bodies shall we see for this process? This has become truly alarming now!!”

Uttar Pradesh

In Gonda, the deadline claimed the life of Vipin Yadav, a dedicated teacher and BLO. The timeline of his death is a testament to the inescapable nature of the pressure. On a recent Tuesday morning, at around 7:30 am—a time when most are preparing for the day—Yadav fell critically ill after reportedly consuming a poisonous substance. Local medical facilities were helpless against the toxicity, prompting a desperate rush to Lucknow’s King George’s Medical University (KGMU) Trauma Centre.

By 3:15 pm, as confirmed by the sub-divisional magistrate (SDM) of Gonda Sadar, Yadav was dead.

Similarly. In Fatehpur, where the administrative machinery showed a complete lack of humanity. Sudhir Kumar Kori, a 25-year-old revenue clerk (lekhpal), committed suicide just one day before his scheduled wedding.

Sudhir was young, employed, and about to start a new chapter of his life with Kajal, a resident of a nearby village. The Haldi and Mehendi ceremonies had already begun; relatives had gathered, and the house was filled with the sounds of celebration. However, hanging over Sudhir was the shadow of the SIR campaign. He had been assigned as a supervisor for the Jahanabad Assembly constituency.

According to his shattered family, Sudhir had been repeatedly requesting leave for his own wedding. It is a request that, in any humane system, would be granted automatically. Instead, the kanungo (revenue inspector) allegedly refused to approve it. Worse, the refusal came with a threat. He was reportedly threatened with suspension for prioritising his marriage over the election commission’s targets, and eventually, he was suspended on Monday.

Caught between the shame of suspension and the pressure of his duties, Sudhir took his own life. The festivities turned into a funeral. While the district administration has promised a “thorough investigation,” for Sudhir’s family, the inquiry is meaningless. The timeline of the SIR drive did not just claim a worker, it destroyed two families before a marriage could even be solemnised.

In Allahabad (Prayagraj) district, Booth-Level Officers (BLOs) are actively refusing or avoiding their duties for the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of voter lists, despite facing penalties like salary cuts and an FIR.

The refusal stems from public anger and resistance against accepting the SIR forms, particularly in rural areas like Phaphamau, where BLOs, often local residents, feel vulnerable. Unlike voters in other regions, voters in Uttar Pradesh reportedly do not fear being delisted and believe they can bypass the exercise, with some also being listed at multiple polling booths.

The resistance is significantly impacting the SIR work, with only 1.5 lakh of the 46.92 lakh voters covered so far, making it unlikely to meet the December 9 target. Authorities have taken action against several BLOs and supervisors for non-compliance, but the officers maintain that the extra work is causing severe stress and public backlash, as the Observer Post reported

Tamil Nadu

In the southern state of Tamil Nadu, the distress has permeated the Anganwadi sector, where workers—already chronically underpaid and overworked—are being drafted for SIR duties. These women, who are responsible for the health and nutrition of the state’s poorest children, are now being broken by the election machinery.

On November 18, Chitra, a 59-year-old anganwadi worker and Booth Level Officer (BLO) in Kumbakonam, Thanjavur, attempted suicide. Fellow workers stated that Chitra, a widow, had consumed pills after being subjected to “immense pressure” and allegedly threatened with suspension by superiors if she failed to digitally upload a large number of SIR entries by a stringent deadline. Her colleagues, who staged a protest demanding action against the officials responsible, claimed that age-related struggles and the stress of unreasonable targets had pushed her to the extreme step.

Chitra was rushed to a government hospital and is reported to be stable, but the incident drew immediate attention to the mental toll the rushed SIR process is taking on frontline employees.

In a similar incident, on November 20, a Booth-Level Officer (BLO) named Jahitha Begum in Kallakurichi district tragically died by suicide due to an alleged excessive workload and pressure related to the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.

According to the Times of India, her husband, Mubarak, and colleagues stated that she was being pressurised by senior officials and political party representatives to expedite the work. Mubarak recounted that his wife, who had a target of 800 SIR forms, was struggling due to poor internet connectivity at the Tirukoilur centre, managing to digitise only 35 forms and collect 80 filled-in forms. After returning home, she reportedly committed suicide by hanging herself.

Her colleagues corroborated the stress, stating that officials were forcing them to collect the filled-in forms from electors within a single day after distribution. The Tirukoilur police have registered a case of suspicious death and are currently investigating the matter, including the husband’s statement.

Collateral damage: the citizen’s panic

The deadly deadline affects not only those holding the pen but those whose names are on the list. In West Bengal, the SIR exercise—which involves verifying old records—has inadvertently triggered deep-seated trauma related to the National Register of Citizens (NRC).

In North 24 Parganas, this fear nearly killed Ashok Sardar. The 63-year-old rickshaw puller threw himself onto railway tracks, resulting in the amputation of a limb. His crime? He could not find his name in the 2002 voter list.

“For days, father kept saying he had no documents,” his daughter Chaitali explained. “He feared he might be thrown out of the country.” The bureaucratic rigor demanded of the BLOs translates into terror for the poor, creating a feedback loop of anxiety that is claiming lives on both sides of the clipboard.

A systemic failure: the “Bihar Model” goes wrong

The root of this crisis seems to be the imposition of the “Bihar Model” of SIR onto other states without considering local realities. Officials claimed the model was a success in Bihar, but its replication is proving lethal across the diverse administrative landscapes of the rest of India. The exercise, which traditionally spans months, has been compressed into a tight window, ignoring the logistical nightmares of different topographies and languages.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, in a letter to the Chief Election Commissioner on November 24, noted that the process suffers from “critical gaps in training, lack of clarity on mandatory documentation and the near-impossibility of meeting voters in the midst of their livelihood schedules.”

The system assumes a level of digitisation and manpower that simply does not exist on the ground. It relies on the unpaid labour of Anganwadi workers and the coerced labour of teachers, assuming their resilience is infinite. The last three weeks have proven it is not. The digital infrastructure, meant to streamline the process, has instead become a bottleneck, with servers crashing and data vanishing, forcing BLOs to redo work they have already completed, often late into the night.

SIR is no reform; it’s an imposed tyranny: Rahul Gandhi

The mounting death toll has drawn sharp criticism from the highest echelons of the opposition. Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, termed the SIR exercise an “imposed oppression.” In a statement, Gandhi slammed the Centre and the Election Commission, alleging that the chaotic implementation of SIR is a “conspiracy to sacrifice democracy” at the cost of civil servants’ lives.

“SIR is an ‘imposed oppression’… causing chaos in the country,” Gandhi stated.

Despite these high-profile interventions, the grinding pace of the SIR continues. The Election Commission maintains its deadline. The supervisors continue to issue threats of suspension. In addition, in the homes of Shantimoni Ekka, Mukesh Jangid, Aneesh George, Arvind, Ushaben, Vipin Yadav, and Sudhir Kumar Kori, there is only silence.

The “Deadly Deadline” remains in place, and millions of government employees remain caught between a directive from ECI and the limits of human endurance, wondering who among them will be next to fall. The SIR drive, as ECI claims intended to strengthen the foundation of Indian democracy, is currently being built on the broken backs of the very people tasked with upholding it.

Related:

SIR exercise leaves trail of suicide across states as BLOs buckle under pressure and citizens panic over citizenship

Haunted by NRC fears, 57-year-old West Bengal man dies by suicide; Mamata blames BJP for turning democracy into a “theatre of fear”

Pregnant woman deported despite parents on 2002 SIR rolls, another homemaker commits suicide

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