Kolkata, March 5 – The Election Commission of India (ECI) has informed the office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) that the progress in poll preparations in two districts bordering Bangladesh in West Bengal for the upcoming Assembly elections has not been satisfactory so far.
These two districts are South 24 Parganas in South Bengal and Cooch Behar in North Bengal.
Sources in the CEO’s office said that last week, the ECI’s top brass at its headquarters in New Delhi held a virtual meeting with electoral officers up to the district level, as well as with senior bureaucrats and police officers in the state. They gathered information from them about the poll preparations in different districts in the state.
“After examining the inputs received last week, the ECI identified the shortcomings in poll preparedness. Although Wednesday was a holiday due to the Holi festival, Deputy Election Commissioner Gyanesh Bharati held a brief virtual meeting with the electoral officers of West Bengal, including the district magistrates, who are also the district electoral officers, on Wednesday night. In that meeting, Bharati expressed dissatisfaction with the progress in poll preparedness in South 24 Parganas and Cooch Behar,” said an insider at the CEO’s office.
Bharati is likely to hold another round of virtual meetings with the electoral officers, including the district electoral officers, on Thursday, and in that meeting, he is likely to provide information on the steps needed to expedite the poll preparedness process.
According to the schedule, the full bench of the Election Commission of India (ECI) will arrive in West Bengal on the night of March 8. For the next two days, that is on March 9 and March 10, the full bench will hold several rounds of marathon meetings to review the ongoing judicial adjudication of voter documents classified under the logical discrepancy category, and to discuss poll preparations.
Meanwhile, CPI(M) leaders and workers staged a night-long sit-in demonstration in front of the CEO’s office in central Kolkata since late Wednesday evening, demanding that the polling dates in West Bengal should not be announced by the Commission unless the process of judicial adjudication is completed and the list of all genuine voters is ensured.
The sit-in demonstration continued on Thursday morning, and CPI(M) leaders said that the protest will continue as long as the CEO of West Bengal, Manoj Kumar Agarwal, meets them.
The final voter list was published on February 28, excluding those names that were referred for judicial adjudication. Supplementary lists will be published as per the progress of the judicial adjudication.
