Kolkata: In a surprising turn of events, the West Bengal State Election Commission on Thursday said the upcoming panchayat polls will be held in a single phase as opposed to three announced earlier, prompting opposition fears the elections could be rigged in the absence of inadequate security arrangements.
Nilanjan Shandilya, secretary of the commission, on Thursday said that in consultation with the state government, it had been decided that polling across the state will take place on 14 May. The notification issued on Thursday does not, however, say when the votes are to be counted. The date for counting will be notified separately, the commission said.
The commission decided on a single-phase polling in view of approaching monsoons and the start of the holy month of Ramzan on 15 May, according to Shandilya.
Polling was scheduled to be held in three phases between 1 May and 5 May and the votes counted on 8 May. But the original schedule had to be changed because the Calcutta high court intervened and briefly stalled the electoral process after the commission extended the window for filing nominations and then reversed its decision overnight.
Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, a leader of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), or CPM, and a lawyer, said it was impossible to provide adequate security cover if polling is held on the same day across the state and that he will move the Calcutta high court on Friday, seeking its intervention. The Congress, too, will seek judicial intervention on Friday.
When asked on Thursday if central forces are to be deployed for polling, officials at the commission said it hadn’t decided on the matter.
The administration has at its disposal some 58,000 armed police personnel split between West Bengal Police and the Kolkata Police. That apart, there are 12,000 baton-wielding policemen who are to be deployed on the day of polling, according to officials at the commission cited above, who asked not to be identified.
There are over 50.8 million voters, and votes are to be cast in 58,467 booths.
Available forces are so inadequate that even top IPS officers would have to be detailed to guard polling booths, said Sayantan Basu, general secretary of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Meanwhile, after scrutiny of nominations, it emerged on Thursday that the BJP has filed nominations to contest in 34,866 of 58,692 seats to which polling will take place, followed by the CPM-led Left Front, which has fielded 25,256 candidates.
The BJP is ahead of the Left parties in fielding candidates because the Trinamool Congress allowed them to file nominations, said Rabin Deb, a veteran CPM leader and a member of the party’s central committee. But Biswanath Chakraborty, a professor of political science at Rabindra Bharati University, said the CPM had lost its support base.
This isn’t the first time Leftists are facing oppression from the ruling party, said Prasenjit Bose, an economist and a social worker. They have faced it in the 1970s as well, but the CPM could fight back because it had an efficient leadership. But since being ousted from power in 2011, the CPM and its allies have not been able to stem the rot, he added