The Trinamool Congress on Saturday alleged discrepancy in the voting process as 30 Assembly seats in West Bengal went to polls in the first phase of elections. The Bharatiya Janata Party, on the other hand, accused the ruling party of attacking one of its leaders. Delegations of both the parties met the Election Commission in the afternoon.
In the morning, Trinamool Congress Rajya Sabha MP Derek O’ Brien alleged that there was mismatch in the voter turnout data issued by the Election Commission, ANI reported.
“Voter turnout for ACs [Assembly constituencies] Kanthi Dakshin and Kanthi Uttar at 9.13 am was 18.47% and 18.95% respectively,” he said. Four minutes later, at 9.17 am, the voter turnout reduced to 10.60% and 9:40%. Such discrepancy raises question on genuineness of data issued by EC.”
The party tweeted two images of the turnout figures too, which show the discrepancy mentioned by O’Brien.
Later, the Trinamool Congress tweeted screenshot from a news website where a section of voters in Majna of Kanthi Dakshin constituency claimed that their votes were cast in favour of the saffron party even if they polled for someone else.
“Many voters in Kanthi Dakshin assembly seat allege that they voted for TMC but VVPAT [Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail] showed them the BJP symbol,” the TMC tweeted. “This is serious. This is unpardonable.”
In the afternoon, a delegation of the party led by MP Sudip Bandyopadhyay met the Election Commission in Kolkata and submitted a memorandum. They urged the poll body to revert back a recent rule change regarding polling agents in booths, PTI reported. Last week, the poll panel gave permission to appoint polling agents from anywhere in the Assembly constituency. Earlier, they had to be registered as voters in the respective polling booths.
Bandyopadhyay told reporters after meeting Chief Electoral Officer Aariz Aftab that only locals living in the Assembly segment where the booth was located should be appointed as polling agents.
“This [the new rule] has caused a lot of problems in the booths in the first phase as many of the agents don’t even know each other,” the Trinamool leader said.
BJP alleges attack on Suvendu Adhikari’s brother
Meanwhile a BJP delegation, led by party leader Kailash Vijayvargiya, also met the Election Commission after an alleged attack by Trinamool Congress supporters on the car of Adhikari’s brother Soumendu Adhikari, ANI reported.
Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Vijayvargiya said that the election was the first one in six years with fewer instances of rigging and violence. “To avoid even 10% of such cases in second phase [of polls] we demanded Election Commission to round up anti-social elements,” he said.
Earlier, Soumendu Adhikari alleged that TMC supporters attacked his car and beat up his driver in Contai town of East Midnapur district, in an attempt to rig the elections, NDTV reported.
“Under the leadership of the TMC block President, Ram Govind Das and his wife, poll rigging was underway at three booths,” Adhikari told NDTV. “They attacked my car and thrashed my driver as me coming here created problems for them.”
He alleged that four BJP members have been hospitalised after being beaten up.
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