Kolkata, July 10: Barring minor incidents, the re-polling ordered by the state election commission in 696 booths in 19 districts of Bengal passed off peacefully with 69.85-per cent of all eligible voters casting their ballots turnout till 5 pm, officials said.
Violence that left 15 people dead and allegations of vote tampering had marred the three tier panchayat elections held on Saturday, forcing the SEC headed by Rajiva Sinha to order a repoll in affected booths in all but three districts of Bengal.
“No major untoward incidents were reported from the districts where repolling is underway. A couple of stray incidents happened and those were managed by the police,” an SEC official said.
However, one person died due to cardiac arrest while standing in the queue to vote in Tehatta sub-division of Nadia district, police said.
Commenting on the repolling, Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari said the BJP had submitted a list of 6,000 booths to the SEC where it wanted re-election.
“Actually, false voting took place in 18,000 booths at the behest of the TMC. We are collecting more evidence.
TMC state general secretary Kunal Ghosh however alleged that the violence on the election day was perpetrated by opposition parties.
“It is TMC that has suffered the most due to this opposition-sponsored violence. Central forces did not arrive despite requisition by the SEC. Today’s poll has been peaceful and it proves that SEC has taken steps to control the situation,” he said.
Senior TMC leader and state minister Shashi Panja alleged that the BJP, Congress and ISF had been continuously instigating their workers in the run-up to the polls. “Over 60 per cent of people killed in violence belong to the TMC,” she claimed.
Meanwhile, BJP leader Rahul Sinha demanded that the “elections should be held again under the watchful eyes of courts”.
CPI(M) West Bengal secretary Mohd Salim on Monday alleged that both the central forces and the state police failed to perform their duties to protect voters during the July 8 panchayat elections.
“Both the central forces and the state police did not perform their duty to protect voters,” he said.
BSF DIG S S Guleria had however said that despite efforts by the central forces to get the list of sensitive booths from the State Election Commission, it was not provided. (PTI)
