At a BJP protest against panchayat poll-related violence, in Kolkata on Tuesday (Express photo by Shubham Dutta)
The Calcutta High Court on Tuesday refused to intervene in the state panchayat poll process. It disposed of the Congress and BJP’s petitions seeking an extension to the nomination filing process for the election. “Today the Congress and the BJP filed separate petitions seeking an extension to the nomination process after giving example of incidents of violence,’’ ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) lawyer Kalyan Banerjee told reporters outside the high court.
“The BJP said its (candidates) could not file nominations due to the violence. However, the State Election Commission (SEC) produced data which showed the number of BJP candidates who filed their nominations.’’
Banerjee said the court called the petitions “not entertainable” and disposed them of.
Petitioner and state BJP general secretary Pratap Banerjee said they never wanted to stall the poll process. “We had moved the court to demand free and fair nominations. Today, the court said it would not interfere in the panchayat process. It is not about winning or losing in the court. It is about registering our protest,” Banerjee said.
The Congress said it would move the court’s division bench. “Today, the court did not interfere in the election process. The court observed there is no question of interfering as the election process has started. We have taken a decision to appeal before the division bench,” said lawyer and Congress leader Riju Ghoshal.
Earlier, the court directed the SEC to consult stakeholders over security arrangements for the election. Justice Subrata Talukdar asked the commission to be mindful of the Supreme Court directive over it to address grievances. He underlined that the SEC will be the final decision-maker on security arrangements. Talukdar directed the panel to inform an acting chief justice J Bhattacharya-led division bench on the security arrangements while citing concerns of the Opposition over them.
Despite SEC-govt meet, no decision on voting dates
The State Election Commission could not finalise fresh dates for conducting the panchayat elections, despite holding a meeting with state panchayat department officials on Tuesday. Officer on Special Duty (OSD) of the state panchayat department, Sourav Das, met State Election Commissioner A K Singh at his office for around 50 minutes. However, with the results being inconclusive, Commission sources said another meeting would be held on Wednesday.
(With PTI inputs)