Two days after the final electoral roll under the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) was published in West Bengal, the Union Home Ministry on Monday (March 2, 2026) notified two more empowered committees to fast-track citizenship applications under the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).
In all, four such committees headed by Central government officials have been formed to clear applications, three of them in the past 10 days. West Bengal goes to polls in the next two months.
Bengal’s Muslim districts have highest number of cases awaiting adjudication under SIR
Thousands of people belonging to the Matua community, comprising Hindu Namasudras with roots in Bangladesh, have applied or are being encouraged by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to apply for citizenship under CAA. Their names were not in the 2002 electoral rolls, and subsequently, did not appear in the final SIR list published on February 28.
Ever since the CAA was implemented in 2024, the Ministry has not provided any data on the number of applications received or citizenship certificates granted under the Act, particularly in West Bengal.
