Trekkers’ dream in Bengal is a poll logistics nightmare

DARJEELING: A 7km-trek for eight hours on the trot with two mules for company, before a thunderstorm snapped all communication with the outside world for the night. One more trek to Sikkim early in the morning to arrange for a portable mobile charger. All this to ensure that 885 voters of the remote Srikhola village, around 16km from Sandakphu in Darjeeling — Bengal’s highest booth — could exercise their franchise on Thursday.
The Srikhola Primary School booth in Darjeeling’s Bijonbari block, at an altitude of 2,800 metres above sea level, may be a trekker’s dream, but it’s a logistical nightmare for poll officials.
After an arduous journey, the team of 11 men — three election personnel, five BSF jawans, two porters and a cop from the local Loderma police station — and two mules made it to Srikhola just in time to ensure polling as scheduled. The route — at the foothills of the Singalila National Park, home of the red pandas — is incredibly beautiful, flanked by flame-red rhododendron, winding through chestnut and oak forests, but the officials, hardly had any eye for it.
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