Kolkata, February 26 A heated exchange of words erupted between Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra and Electoral Roll Observer C S Murugan over allegations related to the role of micro-observers in revising electoral rolls.
The controversy began on February 18 when Moitra, in a post on X, stated that the official was exceeding his authority.
"Please control your Roll Observer C Murugan IAS 2007, Dy. Chairperson, Tea Board, who is issuing incorrect instructions to micro observers via secret WhatsApp groups, in violation of Supreme Court orders," she wrote, sharing an image referencing a film character and captioned it 'Quick Gun Murugan'.
In what was seen as a response, Murugan posted on X on February 26 without naming anyone.
"I do not have as many guns as depicted in the picture. However, I was trained to handle different types of guns and used them legally and effectively during my four and a half years of training in police service in Tamil Nadu," he stated in a late counter post on social media.
There was no immediate response from Moitra to Murugan's counterpost on social media.
The exchange follows earlier claims by TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee that Murugan had been issuing instructions via WhatsApp to micro-observers to delete voters' names. Banerjee had also shared purported screenshots of such messages on his X handle.
Banerjee had charged that Election Commission officials were using micro-observers beyond their prescribed role to facilitate the deletion of names from voter lists, allegedly in violation of the directions of the Supreme Court of India.
"Even more disturbing are credible reports of Special Roll Observer, C Murugan, issuing instructions regarding the acceptability of birth certificates directly to micro observers in a WhatsApp group, to inflate the number of deletions," he had said.
"Do I need to remind the ECI of the Supreme Court's categorical directive that the role of micro-observers must remain strictly assistive? Why then is the statutory procedure being bypassed, and under whose instructions?" he had said in his earlier post.
Denying the accusations of Banerjee, Murugan had earlier told the media, "No directive has been issued to anyone via WhatsApp messages. Only clarifications were given on some directives of the ECI."
