Bengal: Panchayat elections countermanded in 20 booths in 3 districts

The Trinamool Congress has already secured a massive victory in the violence-scarred panchayat elections

Kolkata: The West Bengal State Election Commission (SEC) on Thursday countermand the panchayat polls in 20 booths in three districts because of various malpractices during the counting process, a senior official said.

Fresh voting will be held in those booths at a later date to be notified in due course.

---

The decision to countermand the elections at Habra Block-2 in North 24 Parganas district, Sankrail block in Howrah district and Singur block in Hooghly district was taken after different incidents including snatching of polled ballot papers affected the counting, he said.

“Election has been countermanded at 20 booths. Sankrail has the maximum number of such booths at 15. Fresh elections at these booths will be held later,” he said.

The Trinamool Congress has already secured a massive victory in the violence-scarred panchayat elections.

The TMC won all 20 Zila Parishads in the three-tier panchayat system, bagging 880 seats, while its nearest rival BJP won 31 seats of the total 928. The Congress-Left Front alliance secured 15 seats while others won the remaining two seats.

The ruling party of the stage emerged victorious in over 6,450 panchayat samiti seats. The BJP has won nearly 1000 seats, while the CPI(M) and the Congress have won over 180 and 260 seats.

The TMC won over 35,000 gram panchayat seats out of the total 63,219. The BJP won nearly 10,000 seats, while the Left-Congress bagged about 6,000 seats.

However, though the counting which began on July 11 was over, the final figures were yet to be announced as the compilation and dissemination process was not complete, a senior official told PTI.

Meanwhile, a war of words broke out between the ruling party and the opposition BJP on Thursday over the violence that rocked parts of the state.

Sharing a few video clips on Twitter, the leader of the opposition Suvendu Adhikari of the BJP alleged that the counting process was rigged.

He claimed that people resisted the violence on polling day and went to the booths to cast their votes, but they could not do the same at the counting centres where the administration perpetrated a “loot”.

“At the counting centres, the whole system worked to corner and create pressure on the opposition,” he alleged.

Hitting back, TMC state general secretary Kunal Ghosh said that Adhikari was “preaching” about free and fair elections when under his watch, the BJP “unleashed absolute havoc” in his home district Purba Medinipur during the election.

West Bengal Governor Dr CV Ananda Bose has directed State Election Commissioner Rajiva Sinha to take up the 7,500 complaints received by the ‘Peace Room’ set up at the Raj Bhavan with the Calcutta High Court “for judicial scrutiny”.

The governor opened the Peace Room on June 18, days after the elections were announced, keeping “in view the numerous representations received from citizens on criminal intimidation in pre-poll Bengal.”

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday claimed that 19 people, mostly from her TMC, died in poll-related violence since the election date was announced on June 8. Police sources, however, have put the number of fatalities at 37.

The Calcutta High Court on Wednesday said that the panchayat elections and the declaration of results will be subject to its final orders in connection with matters that it is hearing over allegations of electoral malpractices on the day of polling.

The SEC has directed the district panchayat officers and district magistrates to comply with the high court order and inform the candidates who have been declared elected about this.