Kolkata: Opposition parties in West Bengal are bracing for more violence on Monday as they make one more attempt to file nomination papers for upcoming panchayat elections.
The state election commission on Saturday extended the window for filing nominations by a day following a Calcutta high court order, but opposition parties are concerned that their candidates will again face obstruction.
Leaders of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), or CPM, and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) said over the weekend that they will again seek judicial intervention if on Monday their candidates are forcibly stopped from filing nomination.
But the ruling Trinamool Congress said opposition parties such as the BJP and CPM have not been able to field candidates because they do not have anyone who is willing to contest.
The opposition parties are behind on filing nominations in districts such as Birbhum, Bankura and Burdwan. In Birbhum alone, opposition parties couldn’t field candidates in 41 of 42 zilla parishad seats when nomination filing ended on 9 April.
The BJP is ready to file nominations in these districts on Monday, said Sayantan Basu, the party’s general secretary in West Bengal. “But the question is would the Trinamool Congress allow our candidates to file nominations?” he said.
The Trinamool Congress’s district vice president for Birbhum, Abhijit Singha, said the BJP was welcome to file nominations. “But do they have enough supporters in Birbhum to field candidates for 2,257 gram panchayat seats in the district?” he asked.
Congress state president Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said on Friday immediately after the Calcutta high court passed its verdict that the extension may not make much difference because the Trinamool Congress will again drive away candidates.
But Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, a lawyer who appeared for the CPM at the Calcutta high court last week, said his party would again move court if its candidates were not allowed to file nominations.
Though the Supreme Court was initially hesitant to interfere with panchayat election, it has not been made clear by the apex court if the judiciary could intervene even after the electoral process had started.
The panchayat election in the state was halted by the Calcutta high court, and the order of injunction by justice Subrata Talukdar was upheld by a division bench of the same court. Since then, the election commission has been treading cautiously, said a key panchayat department officer, who asked not to be named.
On Saturday, the commission said that more nominations will be received on Monday and that the last day for withdrawing nominations is 28 April, but it held off on announcing the new polling schedule.
The commission has been ordered by the Calcutta high court to consult all key “stakeholders” before deciding on a revised schedule, and the commission is inclined to discuss the schedule with opposition parties, according to the official cited above.
Polling was scheduled to take place in three phases between 1 May and 5 May and the votes were to be counted on 8 May. But a new schedule has to be decided because a gap of 21 days between filing of nominations and polling is a statutory requirement.