In a stern letter to West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee, the Election Commission on Tuesday said it would not like to keep on being put in the dock for alleged proximity to any political entity.
Despite meeting representatives of the TMC in Kolkata and the national capital in the recent past, "if it is stated by Hon'ble CM that the commission should meet political parties, it is only an attempt to belittle the institution of commission with repeated innuendos and averments", the poll panel said in response to a letter from Banerjee to Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora.
"Commission maintains the position that they would not like to keep on being put in the dock for alleged proximity to any political entity," Deputy Election Commissioner in charge of West Bengal Sudeep Jain wrote to Banerjee.
If the chief minister "persists in creating and attempting to perpetuate this myth for reasons best known to her, it is singularly unfortunate", he said, and added that it was only for her to adjudge why she was doing so.
Addressing rallies in West Bengal on Tuesday, Banerjee accused Union Home Minister Amit Shah of "hatching a conspiracy" to harass TMC leaders ahead of the assembly polls, and sought to know if the Election Commission was taking instructions from him.
The CM also said that she would be forced to stage a protest outside the poll panel's office if the BJP continues to "interfere" in its day-to-day functioning.
(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
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