The Election Commission on Friday rejected the nomination of BJP’s Birbhum Lok Sabha candidate Debasish Dhar as he failed to produce a “no dues” certificate during the scrutiny.
Anticipating the cancellation of former IPS officer Dhar’s nomination, the BJP had on Thursday fielded a second candidate, Debtanu Bhattacharya, in Birbhum.
“It is mandatory for anyone who resigned from central or state government service to settle his dues before contesting any election. As Debasish Dhar has failed to produce the document, his nomination was cancelled,” said a senior state government official.
Dhar said he would move Calcutta High Court challenging the cancellation of his candidature. A source said Dhar moved the bench of Justice Sabyasachi Bhattacharyya
of the high court on Friday
but the court declined to accept the matter for urgent hearing.
“We had a hunch that the court would not intervene during the election process. That is why we fielded a backup candidate,” said a BJP leader.
A source in the BJP said the state government was yet to accept the police officer’s resignation.
Three-term Trinamool Congress MP Satabdi Roy is seeking re-election from Birbhum which will go to the polls on May 13.
Senior BJP leaders said the cancellation of Dhar’s nomination was the result of the vindictive politics of the Mamata Banerjee government.
“We don’t have any complaints against the Election Commission. It is the result of the vindictive politics of Mamata Banerjee’s government that did its best to prevent the senior police officer from contesting the election. We received the news of conspiracy from our sources that helped us field another candidate here,” said Jagannath Chattopadhyay, a BJP state general secretary.
Several BJP leaders said the cancellation of the nomination came as an embarrassment for them.
“It is embarrassing for the party as well as the former IPS officer. As Dhar extensively campaigned in the past 15 days, visiting remote pockets of the constituency, a large number of voters became familiar with the nominee. Now we have to introduce another candidate in all those places in the next 15 days,” said a BJP leader.
Understanding the crisis, senior BJP leaders, including the current party nominee Bhattacharya, started banking on Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
“Who the candidate here is not an issue as people will vote for our leader Prime Minister Narendra Modi ji and his performance in the past 10 years. So, a change in the candidate would not be an issue,” said Bhattacharya.
The BJP leaders, however, said Bhattacharya was not an unknown face in Birbhum
politics as he worked for over 10 years in the district as an RSS activist before he was appointed cluster-in-charge of the BJP. He currently takes care of four Lok Sabha seats, including Birbhum and Bolpur.
Satabdi Roy said: “Although he (Dhar) is my opponent, I feel sorry for him. However, either he or the new face against me, would not have any impact in ensuring my victory.”
On the cancellation of Dhar’s nomination, chief electoral officer (CEO) Aariz Aftab said: “This is a quasi-judicial process. I cannot make any comment. There might be some lapses in the nomination process and so, the returning officer might have cancelled his nomination.”
