West Bengal Municipal Election 2022: Counting of votes for 108 civic bodies that went to poll on February 27 will be undertaken tomorrow, i.e., March 2, in West Bengal amid allegations of malpractices by the opposition parties. The polling that recorded over 78 per cent voter turnout was ‘very peaceful’, noted Director-General of Police Manoj Malaviya. The State Election Commission has set up over 12,000 polling booths for the elections. A total of 8,160 candidates are in the fray from the 2276 wards that went to the polls. Voting was not held in 103 wards as TMC won most of these seats uncontested. Of the total candidates, 2,258 are from the TMC, 2,021 of the BJP, 1,588 of the CPI(M), 965 of the Congress, 843 independents, 117 of Forward Block, 76 of RSP, 30 of BSP, 99 of CPI, two of NCP and 158 other candidates.
The saffron party has already written to the SEC demanding cancellation of the polls and urging it to hold re-polling in all 108 municipalities including Dinhata where the ruling TMC won all wards uncontested. The BJP also approached West Bengal governor Jagdeep Dhankhar for re-polling under central forces. The governor had asked state election commissioner Saurabh Das to brief him on the incidences of violence in the civic polls. The TMC then accused the governor of working on the behest of the BJP.
While sporadic clashes erupted between TMC and BJP supporters in Bhatpara municipality, some outsiders were found in queues at some polling booths in Barrackpore and Dum Dum municipalities in North 24 Parganas district. The BJP had alleged rigging by the TMC in many booths, an allegation denied by the ruling party.
Congress leader Isha Khan Chowdhury had alleged that TMC supporters were not allowing the party’s ward 15 candidates to enter polling station 155. In Jalpaiguri Municipality’s ward 12, Congress candidate Narayan Chandra Sarkar had alleged that he was thrown out of a booth by police, while TMC members were campaigning at the same place for their party’s candidate.
A total of 44,000 police personnel, 135 observers, including 10 special senior observers and 108 general observers were deployed to ensure free and fair polls in the election where around 95.6 lakh voters were eligible to exercise their franchise.