January 08, 2025 04:33 pm (IST)
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WB municipal election: Re-poll on Friday, TMC welcomes, oppositions to boycott
Kolkata, Oct 8 (IBNS): The opposition parties including the Left Front (LF), Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Congress on Thursday decided to boycott the re-poll in West Bengal's Bidhannagar (Salt Lake) and Asansol municipal corporations, which will be conducted on Friday.
West Bengal state president of BJP, Rahul Sinha said in a press conference here, "We requested the state election commission to conduct re-poll in all booths in Asansol, Howrah and Bally municipal corporations. But commission is going to conduct re-polls in only 11 booths in Bidhannagar and Asansol which is very unfortunate. So, we have decided to boycott the re-polls and the counting too. We will hold a protest rally in Kolkata on Oct 11."
West Bengal Pradesh Congress president Adhir Choudhury told IBNS: "Few days ago, we announced to boycott the re-polls if it would not be conducted in all booths. We are going to boycott it and the counting too."
A Left Front delegation led by CPI-M leader Rabin Deb met West Bengal governor Keshari Nath Tripathi on Thursday and submitted a deputation regarding this matter.
Rabin Deb told the media later, "We will boycott tomorrow's re-polls. We told the governor about the entire matter. I requested the interim state election commissioner Alapon Banerjee to call for an all-party-meeting before announcing the re-poll, but he did not. We are not supporting his decision to conduct re-polls in only 11 booths."
All opposition parties have also decided not to deploy polling-agents to booths in the re-poll.
Interim WB state election commissioner Alapon Banerjee has promised to ensure the security of voters during the re-polls on Friday.
"Today I discussed the security issue during the re-polls with the police commissioners of Bidhannagar and Asansol. They told me that they would ensure the security of voters during the election," he said.
However, the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) welcomed the decision of the state election commissioner.
Kolkata Mayor Shovan Chatterjee told IBNS: "The Trinamool Congress welcomes state election commissioner's decision to conduct re-poll tomorrow and declare the results on Saturday."
On Thursday evening, demanding re-polls in all booths in three municipal corporations, all LF candidates of Bidhannagar-Rajarhat municipal corporation polls and CPI-M leaders Gautam Deb, Rabin Deb and Asim Dasgupta went to state election commission's office and met the commissioner.
The LF has also decided to start sit-in-demonstration in front of state election commission's office from 4 pm. on Friday.
Meanwhile, challenging the appointment of state's administrative officer Alapon Banerjee to the constitutional post- election commissioner, one resident of Salt Lake filed a writ petition before the bench of justice Dipankar Dutta in the Calcutta High Court on Thursday. The next hearing of the petition will start from 12 pm. on Friday.
Amid violence, civic polls were conducted in Bidhannagar, Howrah and Asansol municipal corporations on Oct 3.
After the election was concluded, former state election commissioner Susanta Ranjan Upadhyaya resigned from his post Tuesday (Oct 6) and West Bengal transport secretary Alapon Banerjee has been appointed as interim election commissioner.
After meeting the district magistrates and police commissioners of Bidhannagar (Salt Lake), Howrah and Asansol, Alapon Banerjee on Thursday announced to conduct re-polls in nine booths in Bidhannagar (Ward no. 9, 33, 34 and 41) and two booths in Asansol (Ward no. 14 and 75) on Friday.
However, the counting date has been set on Saturday (Oct 10).
(Reporting by Deepayan Sinha)
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