Kolkata/Nandigram (WB), Oct 6: West Bengal Congress president Subhankar Sarkar on Tuesday demanded total re-polling in both Nandigram and Rejinagar assembly seats, where by-elections were underway, for alleged intimidation of voters and forcible eviction of our agents.
The party’s Nandigram candidate Milan Pradhan alleged that the bypoll in the seat has been marked by “vote-loot, voters’ intimidation and biased action of the police and security forces”.
The Congress’s Rejinagar nominee Mohammad Abdullahil Kafi also staged a sit-in outside the local police station, demanding cancellation of the bypolls and fresh polling.
“Our Rejinagar candidate has begun a sit-in before the local PS protesting the forcible eviction of our agents from over a hundred booths in that constituency. Later we found that Congress agents were roughed up and forced to leave from almost all the booths in Rejinagar,” Sarkar alleged at a press conference in the party state unit’s headquarters ‘Bidhan Bhavan’ in Kolkata.
The party had intimated the EC on Monday night that a conspiracy to rig the polls has been hatched under the leadership of the inspector in charge of Rejinagar police station and from all levels of the administration,” he said.
“An atmosphere of intimidation has been created in such a manner that except the BJP workers, no one else can stay inside the polling booths,” Sarkar added.
He further alleged that all booths in Nandigram block II and several polling stations in block I “have been captured” by the ruling BJP.
“Our candidate ran around from pillar to post to stop the electoral malpractices from taking place. If common voters had been able to come out and vote, then the polling percentage would have been higher. But then the BJP would have changed the EVMs,” Sarkar said.
The Nandigram assembly seat in Purba Medinipur district recorded a polling percentage of 71.79 till 3 pm, the first eight hours of voting, officials said.
Sarkar claimed that the BJP is currently controlling the polling mechanism in Nandigram while no EC official or observer is present there.
Meanwhile, Pradhan, who is currently out on interim bail granted by the Calcutta High Court after he was arrested in connection with criminal cases arising from the 2007 anti-land acquisition agitation in Nandigram, alleged that the police tried to restrict his movement in the constituency during the polls.
“A climate of hooliganism and utter lawlessness is prevailing in Nandigram for the past few days. Miscreants are moving around on motorcycles at night and threatening my agents and supporters not to come out and vote. They have snatched the identity cards of my poll agents,” he told PTI Videos.
“Nearly a hundred women from the Rajaram Chowk area had come to me alleging that their voter slips were snatched outside polling stations by a group of people who forcibly turned them back, saying their votes have already been cast. These are clear signs of looting of votes and trampling of democracy. Places where people have been able to cast their votes have spoken against the government,” he added.
Pradhan alleged that the police are asking him to leave the area and the CRPF jawans have beaten him up with lathis in front of senior officers.
“The police have taken up the task of making people vote in favour of the ruling BJP,” he said, alleging that shops of minority voters are getting looted and the police are acting as mere onlookers.
The candidate said that he has lodged multiple complaints before the Election Commission but wasn’t hopeful of receiving justice from the poll watchdog.
“The Commission is also working for the government. Gyanesh Kumar is actually Vanish Kumar, who is controlled by the BJP headquarters. We have lodged our complaints before the EC because that is an official procedure, but we are not hopeful of receiving justice from the poll body,” he said.
During the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in West Bengal, the TMC described Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar as ‘Vanish Kumar’, accusing him of making people’s voting rights ‘vanish’.
