Last week, Calcutta High Court lambasted the Mamata Government for the large-scale violence that the state has been witnessing since the time the filing of poll nominations has begun for the Three-tier Panchayati Raj System in West Bengal, slated to be held on July 8.
Calcutta High Court judge Amrita Sinha, on Wednesday (June 21), tore into the ruling dispensation for turning a blind eye as the state grapples with continued violence and chaos.
Expressing anger over continuing incidents of violence and clashes, she observed that the election should be stopped if the process involves so much violence, unrest and bloodshed and loss of lives.
“The condition is such that in a Panchayat Election, there is so much unrest, violence and bloodshed. It’s a shame. What is the picture which is going out?” Justice Amrita Singh lambasted, adding that umpteen matter of rape, threats, violence and murder has come up for hearing in her court.
Justice Sinha even remarked that it prima facie appears that the State Election Commission in West Bengal was not being able to carry out its primary responsibilities of conducting a free, fair and peaceful election process.
Justice Sinha orally observed, “So much violence in one Panchayat poll. So much disorder. So many clashes. This is a shame for a state. Why is there so much disorder? What is the State Election Commission doing?”
The observation was made while the single-judge bench of Justice Amrita Singh was hearing allegations of tampering with documents and misrepresenting information provided in the nomination papers of two panchayat poll candidates in the Howrah district.
Justice Amrita Sinha directed the CBI joint director to probe into the allegation by July 5 and submit a report before the court on July 7.
Order to conduct CBI probe overturned, matter to be handled by WB police
However, on June 26, Monday, a division bench of the Calcutta High Court set aside Justice Amrita Sinha’s order for the CBI probe and directed the West Bengal police to inquire into the matter under the supervision of a one-man commission of Justice (retd) Debiprosad Dey.
Political violence in West Bengal
Large-scale political violence has become synonymous with Mamata Banerjee’s West Bengal. Year after year, whether it is during the Panchayat elections in 2018 or the Legislative Assembly elections in 2021 or the 2022 civic body polls, members of the ruling regime unleash unbridled violence to silence the opposition and dissenting voices.
Following the Assembly elections in May 2021, the state of West Bengal saw phenomenal anarchy and bloodshed. Several BJP activists were attacked, intimidated, and killed during the Trinamool Congress-sponsored bloodbath. After the Trinamool Congress (TMC) won the West Bengal Vidhan Sabha elections, party thugs went mad and attacked BJP members in the state.
OpIndia reached out to some of the victims of the violence and spoke with them about their horrific experiences, which they claimed were overtly sponsored by West Bengal’s state apparatus. When speaking, all of the victims attributed the entire sequence of occurrences to Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress, stating that their only fault was that they were affiliated with the Bharatiya Janata Party. Throughout the talk, they all said unambiguously that being a BJP voter is a crime and being a BJP Party Worker is a sin in Bengal.
Similarly, on February 27, 2022, civic body elections in 108 municipalities in 20 districts of West Bengal were marred by incidents of violence, vandalism, assault, and election malpractices.
On the day of the elections, goons associated with the Trinamool Congress hurled crude bombs, tampered with the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) and attacked the candidates and agents belonging to the Opposition parties including BJP, Congress and CPI (M). This was despite the deployment of 44000 police personnel and 135 election observers, including 108 general observers and 10 special observers.
This year too, ahead of the Panchayat polls that are scheduled to take place on July 8 this year, a cycle of violence has begun across the state, resulting in death and destruction, quite expectedly. Goons, associated with the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) party, have created an atmosphere of chaos and unrest since the commencement of the filing of poll nominations. So far, at least 6 people have lost their lives
Reports of violence have come from Cooch Behar, North and South 24 Paraganas, Murshidabad, Birbhum, East Midnapore, and East Burdwan, among other places. In perhaps no other Indian state, so much panchayat poll violence is reported during the nomination-filing stage itself.
