On 16th November, Booth Level Officer (BLO) Aneesh George was found dead in his house. Aneesh, who was a 44-year-old school employee from Ettukudukka in Kannur, Kerala, was serving as BLO for ward no 18 during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in the state. The Payyannur Police has registered a case of unnatural death in the matter.

Before the basic facts of the investigation were even settled, a very specific storyline began to take shape on national televisions and digital platforms. The death was immediately presented as a direct consequence of “unbearable SIR workload” and the case was used to target the Election Commission of India and its ongoing revision of the electoral rolls.

Within the next 24 hours, what happened was not careful journalism but a textbook

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