“The journey to Delhi originates in the rural heartland of Bengal.” Perhaps, these words by senior TMC leader Derek O’Brien best explains the political churning that has been going on in West Bengal in the run-up to the panchayat elections, which will be held tomorrow after the Calcutta High Court last month asked the State Election Commission to reschedule the poll dates. With 40 of the 42 Lok Sabha seats in West Bengal located in villages and semi-urban areas, grip over the rural bodies is a must for parties to have an upper hand before the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
The rescheduling of election dates for 48,650 Gram Panchayat seats, 9217 Panchayat Samiti seats and 825 Zilla Parishad seats has come as a major setback to the Mamata Banerjee government after the Left, BJP and Congress cried foul over the SEC’s flip-flop over the nomination deadline extension, and alleged that the ruling party had unleashed violence across the state and stopped opposition candidates from filing nominations, mainly in Birbhum and Malda. On Friday, Trinamool Congress leader Arabul Islam was arrested and sent to 10-day police custody in connection with the killing of Hafizul Mollah, a supporter of an Independent candidate, in Bhangar, in 24 Parganas South district.
However, TMC leader and Malda district president MM Hossain rubbished the allegations and said the opposition was trying to give political colour to incidents that had no political connection. “A person was murdered in Malda’s Kaliachak due to personal enmity, while another person was shot in Sujanpur after he did not give extortion money while he was returning from a TMC meeting,” Hossain said.
TMC leader and Malda district president MM Hossain said the opposition was trying to give political colour to incidents that had no political connection. (Express photo)
In the midst of this, Banerjee dropped a bomb on Friday, accusing some political parties of hiring killers to murder her. “They (contract killers) have done a recce in and around my house. But I am not scared. Those unable to fight me politically are doing this. I have made a will stating who will run my party after my death,” Mamata told Bengali news channel Zee 24 Ghanta.
EC extends deadline for filing nominations
On April 9, the state election commission extended the deadline for filing nominations to April 10. But the next day, it rolled back its order. After the Calcutta HC order, nomination process was extended till April 23. However, there seemed to be no end to the violence as opposition candidates claimed that “armed hooligans” prevented them from reaching the Block Development Office, with Birbhum and Murshidabad being the most volatile. The opposition parties again approached the HC, which then directed the SEC to accept nominations filed through e-mail, but only to be overruled by the Supreme Court.
The apex court even took cognizance of the submission that about 34 per cent of TMC candidates had won the panchayat polls unopposed and restrained the SEC from notifying the results in respect to the constituencies where there has been no contest without its leave . According to SEC data, TMC has faced no contest in 20,076 of the 58,692 seats. In the last 40 years, there have been only two occasions when the number of uncontested seats crossed 10 per cent — 2003 (11 per cent) and 2013 (10.66 per cent).
Source: Indianexpress
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