In a bizarre incident that has raised serious security concerns, a stack of Aadhaar cards was discovered abandoned outside a park in Kolkata's Salt Lake area on Sunday morning. The discovery was made during the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls in West Bengal.
Discovery by Morning Joggers
The Aadhaar cards were first spotted by morning walkers near the BA-CA playground. Alert residents, including Moushumi Ghosh, immediately notified the local authorities. The Bidhannagar North police promptly arrived at the scene and recovered the discarded documents.
An eyewitness, Protima Mondol, recounted seeing the cards dumped on the ground while bringing her son to the playground. The police collected the evidence and launched a formal investigation into the matter.
Multi-State Mystery Deepens
A senior police officer expressed puzzlement over the incident, confirming that the recovered Aadhaar cards bore addresses from states as far away as Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Maharashtra. The question of how these state-issued identity documents ended up together in a Kolkata park remains the central mystery of the probe.
To unravel this, the police are taking a two-pronged approach. They are meticulously reviewing CCTV footage from the vicinity for any clues about the individuals who dumped the cards. Simultaneously, they plan to contact the phone numbers listed on the cards to verify their authenticity and determine if they were genuinely lost or are counterfeit.
Political Firestorm Erupts
This is not an isolated case in West Bengal. Earlier this month, hundreds of Aadhaar cards were found dumped in a pond in the East Burdwan district, triggering a major political controversy.
The latest discovery has provided fresh ammunition to the Opposition BJP, which has long alleged systemic manipulation of voter lists in the state. BJP leader Rahul Sinha launched a sharp attack, branding West Bengal as the "headquarters for terrorists and infiltrators."
He alleged that the cards were fake and part of a larger operation to facilitate illegal infiltration from Bangladesh. "When SIR began, they realised that they would be caught, so they dumped the cards and ran away," Sinha claimed, asserting that the state has become a "factory for manufacturing fake Aadhaar cards."
The incident has cast a shadow over the electoral roll revision process, with the police investigation now holding the key to uncovering the truth behind the discarded identity documents.
