The Supreme Court on Friday reserved its verdict on the West Bengal Bharatiya Janata Party’s plea seeking to have extended the last day to file nominations for the panchayat polls in the state and also to have nominations forms available online. The bench said it will pronounce its order on Monday, which is the deadline to file the nominations, The Indian Express reported.
In its plea filed on Thursday, the West Bengal BJP alleged that workers of the ruling Trinamool Congress were not allowing its candidates to file their nominations. It also demanded that troops of the Central Reserve Police Force be deployed during the panchayat elections scheduled to be held in three phases on May 1, May 3 and May 5. The results will be declared on May 8.
A bench of justices RK Agrawal and AM Sapre heard the petition on Friday. At the hearing, senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, representing the petitioner, claimed that the Trinamool Congress had turned West Bengal into a “troubled state”. In response, senior lawyer Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who appeared for the West Bengal government, accused the BJP of “fomenting trouble” in the state only to seek the Centre’s attention as the saffron party has “no presence in West Bengal”, according to The Indian Express.
Rohatgi told the bench that the party had to approach the Supreme Court because Calcutta High Court judges had been on a strike since February 19.
The BJP filed the plea a day after a man was killed outside the office of the block development officer in West Bengal’s Bankura district. The saffron party claimed that the victim, Ajit Murmu, was one of its candidates for the panchayat elections. It blamed the Trinamool Congress for his death. The West Bengal Police have neither confirmed Murmu’s political affiliations nor his attackers’ identity yet.
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