Bengal went to war with itself on Sunday morning. There were no missiles, tanks or biological weapons. Instead, the battle-hardened soldiers of Bengal’s political army relied on time-tested and home-made weapons like crude bombs, rods, sticks and their own punches and kicks - all to grab the more than 2,200 wards across 108 civic bodies in the state which went to poll.
A reporter and a cameraperson of a private channel, was assaulted along with the North Dum Dum municipality’s ward 31 candidate of CPM Shibshankar Ghosh.
In the 2021 Assembly polls, CPM was leading from ward 31, which has thrown attention on the ward in this election. Several voters were also allegedly stopped from casting their votes and threatened.
Accounts coming in from different parts of the state were near identical with only the names of places and candidates getting changed.
The former chairman of the Joynagar-Majilpr municipality — the only civic body that was held by the Congress - was beaten and thrown out of the polling booth along with his polling agent. Sarkhel is the Congress nominee from ward 11.
“In the presence of police officers, the Trinamul goons first threatened me and my agent and then assaulted us,” said Sarkhel.
Debashish Chowdhury, a Congress nominee from Maheshtala municipality’s ward 35 has been missing since Sunday morning. “Most of Joynagar municipality area is now under the control of outsiders. Similarly, in Rajpur-Sonarpur municipality wards 3, 14, 15, 16, 17, 22, 26, 28, 31 and 35 have been occupied by outsiders,” said Sujan Chakraborty, CPM central committee member.
The South 24-Parganas district CPM secretary Shamik Lahiri in a letter to the state election commission chief Sourav Das complained of booth capturing in Diamond Harbour municipality’s wards 1 (booths 1 and 2), Ward 3 (booths 5 and 6), Ward 4 (booths 7 and 8), ward 6 (booths 12, 12A and 13), ward 9 (booths 17, 18, 19) and ward 11 (booths 23 and 24) and all booths in wards 1, 34 and 35 of Maheshtala Municipality, where all rival candidates and polling agents were forced out.
“Now let the voters watch whether the state election commission will preside over the butchering of democracy or react to restore the democratic right of the people,” wrote Lahiri.
Newspersons were reportedly locked inside Joynagar police station in South 24-Parganas, while booths 120 t0 122, located opposite the police station was captured. The Kultali Trinamul MLA Ganesh Mandal was alleged to have led a team of goons who assaulted policemen from the Kultali police station.
Opposition workers and the police got involved in a fisticuff after which a lathicharge was ordered. The state election commission has sought a report in this case.
In ward 37 of Rajpur-Sonarpur municipality, at ward 37’s polling station in Rajpur Vidyanidhi school, outsiders went on a rampage before polling had begun and damaged the electronic voting machines. The Congress nominee Soumendu Ghosh was assaulted.
In North 24-Parganas New Barrackpore, bikers roamed the streets of ward 8, in an attempt to keep the voters indoor. The CPM candidate Sandhya Majumdar and her polling agent were assaulted. In Hooghly’s Arambagh, a CPM nominee Sushil Bauri had to leave his home and seek shelter at another place after being chased by Trinamul-backed goons.
Violence was not restricted to South Bengal. In Jalpaiguri, the Congress nominee from ward 12 was allegedly removed from the booth by a senior police officer. The Congress nominee along with other supporters had objected to the presence of outsiders inside the booth.
A complaint also poured in from Maldah’s Englishbazar municipality’s ward 8, where all Opposition polling agents were forced to vacate the premises.
Till 9am, the polling per cent in the state was around 15.66 per cent, with the highest 19.63 being recorded in East Midnapore district and the lowest 10 per cent in Darjeeling.
