BJP mulls legal option on Bengal local poll dates

KOLKATA: The Bengal BJP on Sunday iterated its threat to drag the State Election Commission (SEC) to court on the panchayat poll dates even as other opposition parties chose to resign themselves to their fate because they know once the poll notification is announced, courts are reluctant to interfere in the poll process.
Opposition parties have been left gasping as they have to field candidates to 58,692 gram panchayat, panchayat samiti and zilla parishad seats by next week after the state chose to prepone panchayat polls by two months.

SEC sources say poll timelines have been firmed up according to the West Bengal Panchayat Elections Act 2003, which says the date of nomination should not be later than 21 days from and not before 35 days of the poll date. The three-phase polls will be held on May 1, 3 and 5.

SEC sources said also according to the act, it is within its ambit to allow a five-day window from April 11 to 16 for withdrawal of nominations. According to Section 43 (3) of the act, withdrawal should be on the third day of scrutiny. However, explaining the five-day gap rationale, SEC sources said exemption in the same section has been made for public holidays. April 14 (Ambedkar Jayanti) and April 15 (Bengali new year) are both public holidays. “There has been no deviation from any statutes,” a senior SEC official said.

Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh said: “We are mulling legal options regarding that. We will talk to lawyers by tomorrow and will decide on the next course of action.”

Senior party leader Jayprakash Majumdar said: “We have hardly any option but to move court. The party’s state unit favours a legal challenge. We have also informed Delhi regarding this and are waiting for their approval. The Calcutta High Court being closed is also being weighed in.”

BJP indicated that moving the Supreme Court appeared to be its only option. However, even that might pose a problem. The SC had in several verdicts laid down the law that once the election process began, no court should interfere with it.

Evidently, the Left Front and Congress are therefore unwilling to take the legal route. “There should be a gap of at least two weeks between the announcement and the notification but they are all in a hurry. I don’t know why,” said Sujan Chakraborty, the Left parliamentary party leader in the assembly. “So far as moving court is concerned,” he added, “Left Front has never moved court on election issue and so, we will not move court.”

Congress chose not to speak on the issue officially. But a senior party leader said: “Once an election notification is published, there is nothing much that can be done, unless there is an irregularity in the election process itself.”