Kolkata, April 11 – The BJP wrote a letter to the office of the state's Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) on Saturday, highlighting the illegal appointment of contractual staff as sector officers/assistants in the Kasba Assembly constituency in Kolkata.
In the letter, the party stated: "It has come to light that through an order issued by the Returning Officer, Purnima Dey, WBCS (Exe.), contractual staff have been appointed as 'Sector Assistants' and 'Assistant Sector Officers.' This action appears to be a deliberate attempt to circumvent established norms and raises serious questions about the integrity of the electoral process. The individuals listed in the said order are reportedly contractual employees of the ISGPP Cell under the Panchayat and Rural Development Department, currently attached to the South 24 Parganas Zilla Parishad."
The party said that, according to the Election Commission's guidelines, contractual staff are strictly prohibited from being deployed in sensitive election duties such as sector-level supervision, due to the absence of institutional accountability and service protections that apply to permanent government employees.
"Furthermore, the use of designations such as 'Sector Assistant' and 'Assistant Sector Officer' does not align with the standard hierarchy recognized by the Election Commission of India. This raises strong apprehensions that such titles have been deliberately fabricated to bypass scrutiny. It is also noteworthy that the same individuals were previously designated as 'Sector Officers' in earlier orders, and only after objections were presumably raised, their titles were altered without any substantive change in their roles or responsibilities," the party said.
According to the BJP, such actions constitute a serious violation of the Model Code of Conduct and pose a direct threat to the conduct of free and fair elections.
The BJP urged the Election Commission to immediately stay the implementation of such an order.
"Take strict action against the Returning Officer of the 149-Kasba Assembly Constituency for apparent professional misconduct and bias. Ensure that only eligible and permanent government officials are deployed in all election-related duties in strict compliance with ECI guidelines," the party added.