Tag: Bengal elections

  • Bengal elections: No bike rally after model code is imposed, says poll panel

    Express News Service
    KOLKATA: Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora on Friday said no bike rally will be allowed across Bengal once the model code of conduct is in place ahead of the upcoming Assembly elections in the state. 

    In case of violation, the two-wheelers will be confiscated and released only after the elections, Arora said. “No motorbike rally will be announced before the Assembly election. Police will be given the necessary instructions to seize the two-wheelers and keep them in their custody till the completion of the poll process. The Commission will bring a notification regarding a blanket ban on motorbike rallies,” said Arora.

    The announcement came in the backdrop of complaints by opposition parties that during poll campaigning bike-born party cadres roam at a place to show the strength of their party and terrorise common electorates.

    The full bench of the Election Commission spent two days in Kolkata and held a series of meetings with the bureaucrats and other officials. The meetings were focused on Bengal’s law and order situation as the opposition parties are anticipating large-scale violence before and during the election. The ECI asked Kolkata Police Commissioner Anuj Sharma and Additional Director General of Police (law and order), Gyanwant Singh, to execute all pending non-bailable arrest warrants by the end of this month.

    Arora made it clear that an adequate number of central forces will be engaged in the upcoming elections to ensure a free and fair poll. “An adequate number of CRPF personnel shall be deployed ahead of the election,” he said.

    The CEC said at present the state has 78,903 booths. “An additional 22,887 booths will be created because of the Covid-19 pandemic. All booths will be on the ground floor of the polling stations so that elderly people will face no difficulty to exercise their franchise,” said Arora.          

    Responding to a query on political violence, Arora said the commission has already reviewed the incidents of violence, particularly, those with political overtones that happened in the past six months. “The SPs have come up with presentations regarding this and some of them were excellent. They will be asked to keep a special watch on the violence-prone areas after we send poll observers to the state,” Arora said. 

    The Chief Secretary and Home secretary must also be vigilant against issues of fake information or false propaganda in the social media which were flagged off by a number of political parties, the commission said.

  • Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee ratchets up rhetoric, likens BJP to snake in Junglemahal

    By Express News Service
    KOLKATA: Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee appealed to the voters at a rally in an erstwhile Red stronghold in Bengal to “kick out” the BJP whom she claimed was more dangerous than the Maoists.

    The rally in Purulia was strategic given that the BJP had won all four Lok Sabha seats in Junglemahal, which is spread over Purulia, Bankura, Jhargam and West Midnapore districts, in 2019.

    “BJP is more dangerous than Maoists. It is like a venomous snake which will finish you off in a single bite and consume everything that comes its way,” Mamata said on Tuesday.

    The analogy is being seen as a political gambit given the people in Junglemahal had seen Maoist violence a decade ago. A TMC insider said Mamata sought to deliver the message of ensuring peace in the region.

    Accusing the BJP of misleading the people of Junglemahal, Mamata said the elected representatives were not seen in their constituencies.

    “Do they visit you? Do they work for you? Have they built roads? Have they brought water connections?… Before elections, they will be very sweet and after elections they won’t care. This is what the BJP is all about.

    They only lie,” she said. ‘’Kick them (the BJP) out if they come to seek your vote. If they offer money, accept and reject them.”

    Mamata’s Purulia rally came a day after she announced to contest from Nandigram, the epicentre of a farmers’ movement that propelled her to power a decade ago.

    By choosing Nandigram, Mamata took the fight to the BJP’s camp as her once trusted lieutenant Suvendu Adhikari comes from the region.