Bengal governor C.V. Ananda Bose on Wednesday night is learnt to have refused to accept the joining report of state election commissioner Rajiva Sinha.
The move not only cast a shadow on the continuation of the former chief secretary as the state poll panel chief but also made the July 8 rural polls “uncertain”, said a source.
“The governor did not accept the joining report of the state poll panel chief. The decision came late on Wednesday evening... As there is no such precedent in the recent past, it is still not clear what will happen next,” said the source.
An IAS officer explained that as the governor is the appointing authority of the state election commissioner, the poll panel chief needs to submit a joining report to the governor.
Sources in the saffron camp speculated that Bose's refusal to accept the joining report was the fallout of an instruction from Delhi after the state BJP leaders approached the party's central leadership to prevail upon the governor to take "some action".
The state BJP leadership, especially the leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari, has been upset with Bose for picking Sinha as the poll chief from the list of three senior IAS officers the state government had sent to Raj Bhavan.
“Sinha’s proximity with the government is well known... Had he picked any of the other two, A.R. Bardhan or M.V. Rao, there would not have been any problem,” said a source.
A source in the BJP referred to BJP MP Swapan Dasgupta’s tweets in which he demanded the removal of Sinha.
The state BJP has been upset with Sinha since his appointment because of several reasons, including his announcement of the poll schedule without consulting the Opposition parties.
According to a source in Nabanna, Sinha’s refusal to meet Bose — when he summoned him to discuss poll-related violence — earlier this week on the ground that the official was busy with the scrutiny of nomination papers can also be cited as a reason for not accepting his joining report.
A source said that the governor’s refusal to accept the joining letter does not mean the removal of the poll panel chief.
“The governor can initiate the process of removal of a state election commissioner, but it has to be referred to the high court for an inquiry.... The process is not that simple,” said the source.