From Our Correspondent
TURA: District election officials in West Garo Hills have received as many as eighteen complaints relating to model code of conduct violations while security forces have been conducting regular anti-insurgency operations leading to weapons seizure which included an AK-47 rifle.
The weapon seizure was made during a police operation conducted a week ago against GNLA militants in Gambegre constituency’s Chigitchakgre on February 9 in which the ‘deputy area commander’ of the outfit, Brightwell D Arengh alias Chiga, was nabbed along with another cadre and the AK rifle along with magazines, IED, crude bomb, detonators etc., were confiscated.
A total of 1151 licensed arms have been deposited and after a process of extensive vulnerability mapping and identification of vulnerable hamlets and households and persons who need to be tracked a total of 258 people have been bound down under Section 107 of the CrPC, said Deputy Commissioner Pravin Bakshi in a press statement to the media.
A review meeting held on Sunday to obtain feedback from the flying squad teams about the model code of conduct violations, seizures and action taken, found that in the last few days 18 complaints have been received by the flying squads or the video and static surveillance teams and 15 cases of model code of conduct violations have been registered.
Following these violations show causes have been issued in nine cases where they have been found to be of substantial nature and prima facie true needing further verification, inform election authorities.
The flying squads under the constituted District Level Liquor Monitoring Committee have also conducted 19 raids leading to the seizure of illicit liquor but authorities have refrained from mentioning the amount of seizure.
The flying squads have also brought down posters and banners of political parties that were pasted without the written consent of the owner of the household. A lot of polling material has been seized which was being transported without any authorization in vehicles without any permits. Inspections of accounts of the candidates as part of the elaborate exercise of the expenditure monitoring has also been done under the supervision of the Expenditure Observers.
“The flying squads have been asked to be particularly vigilant and active in the last few days of the intense political campaign and cover all the high profile visits. They have also been instructed to step up the awareness dissemination campaign by announcement of date and time of polling over the public address systems attached to their vehicles and to target the people on the market days and by distributing posters and pamphlets to groups in market places and town areas,” informed Bakshi.
A series of appeals have been made by the District Election Officer to NGOs, church bodies, civil society institutions, Nokma Council, heads of institutions and youth organizations to facilitate maximum voting with ethical voting and voting by conscience as the central theme.
Money, money everywhere but not a note to seize
The Election department in Garo Hills despite having seized illicit liquor, posters and banners, besides a couple of vehicles, have so far failed to recover any substantial amount of illegal hard currency despite reports from villagers about use of money to lure voters in the rural areas, unlike in Khasi and Jaintia Hills where large sums of money without proper documents have been seized.
“It is not as though politicians are clean in Garo Hills and voters are not lured by money. The Election Commission needs to scratch beneath the surface and only then will something turn up. It is as simple as that,” said a political analyst.