Re-polling in 168 booths in Tripura on May 12

Re-polling in 168 polling stations in 26 Assembly segments under the Tripura West parliamentary constituency will be held on May 12 as electoral malpractices were found in the Lok Sabha seat during the April 11 voting, an Election Commission (EC) official said here on Wednesday.

Soon after the poll panel's announcement of re-polling, the opposition Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) and Congress here announced they would move the Supreme Court against the EC decision to hold repolling in only 168 polling stations, instead of the entire Lok Sabha constituency with a total of 1,679 polling stations.

An EC letter to the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Sriram Taranikanti said that on the basis of reports of the CEO, the Special Observer, the General Observers and the Returning Officer, the Commission has declared the April 11 voting at 168 polling stations to be void and appoints May 12 as the date for holding fresh polls.

The CEO told the media here that 141,251 voters, including 69,328 female ones are eligible to cast their votes in the re-polling spread across eight sub-divisions in four districts.

"The political parties would be allowed to campaign until 5 p.m. on Friday," Taranikanti said, adding that it was "disappointing for all of us that we have to conduct re-polling in the parliamentary constituency".

Another election official said that the Union Home Ministry has already deployed 15 companies of Central Paramilitary Forces (CPMF) for re-polling in the Tripura West Lok Sabha seat where voting took place in the first phase of polling on April 11.

The opposition Congress and CPI-M have been demanding fresh polling in the entire Tripura West parliamentary constituency after they alleged large-scale rigging, booth capturing, intimidation and attacks by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and their goons.

The ruling BJP, however, dismissed the accusations and demanded the removal of CEO Taranikanti, accusing him of being a "conspirator".

Allegations of malpractices, intimidation and violence during the April 11 polling in the seat forced the EC to appoint former Deputy Election Commissioner Vinod Zutshi as Special Observer for Tripura and remove Returning Officer Sandeep Mahatme and Additional Director General of Police (Law and Order) Rajiv Singh.

The CEO had earlier said that an unprecedented number of election officials were suspended from service and a huge number of FIRs were filed by the Assistant Returning Officers against Micro Observers, Polling Officers and political activists who either indulged in malpractices or remained mute spectators during this period.

After holding an urgent meeting of top state party leaders here on Wednesday, state CPI-M Secretary Gautam Das said: "As per the official and webcasting records of the EC, large-scale wrongdoings and booth capturing had taken place on April 11 in majority of the 1,679 polling stations."

"The EC decision to hold re-polling in only 168 polling stations is unjustified and deprivation to lakhs of voters in exercising the democratic right," Das said.

Criticising the EC decision, Tripura Pradesh Congress Vice-President Tapas Dey said: "We have now no other alternative but to move the Supreme Court."

Demanding a probe into the election process in the Tripura West Lok Sabha seat, state BJP spokesman Nabendu Bhattacharjee said that his party would win the seat in a record margin of votes.

--IANS

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