KOLKATA, March 9: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday accused CEC Gyanesh Kumar of threatening state officials during a meeting with the administration and warned that “false bravado” by constitutional authorities was not acceptable, stepping up the confrontation between the state government and the poll panel ahead of the assembly elections.
Speaking from the site of her dharna, now in its fourth day, in central Kolkata against the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, Banerjee alleged that the chief election commissioner had adopted a threatening tone towards the state bureaucracy.
“The CEC threatened our officers today at the meeting. I want to tell the CEC that having courage is good, but false bravado is not so,” she said.Her remarks came against the backdrop of the Election Commission’s full bench meeting with senior state administrative and police officials earlier in the day to review preparedness for the assembly elections likely to be held in April.
According to officials present at the meeting, Kumar warned that any lapse in maintaining law and order ahead of the elections would not be tolerated, and strict action would follow if responsibilities were not discharged properly.
The chief election commissioner also questioned the absence of a Narcotics Advisory Committee in the state and asked officials to strengthen monitoring mechanisms ahead of the polls, they said.
Escalating her attack on the poll panel, Banerjee alleged that the ongoing SIR exercise was being used to deprive people of their voting rights.
“We have only one point: everyone must be given the right to vote. Our only issue is to ensure voting rights for all,” the TMC supremo said.
She alleged that intimidation and deletion of names from electoral rolls were being used as political tools.“If you think you can capture power by attacking people, intimidating them and removing names from the voters’ list, that will not happen,” the chief minister asserted, alluding to the alleged BJP-EC nexus.Banerjee also warned sections of the bureaucracy against allegedly acting under political pressure, saying records of their actions were being kept.“Records are being maintained. Today, you may feel protected, but governments change. If the BJP goes tomorrow, where will you go? Then I will be the first to transfer you,” she said.
The chief minister also alleged that institutions and agencies which once maintained neutrality were increasingly acting in a partisan manner.“Earlier, they always remained neutral, but now many agencies have become one-sided,” she claimed.
In a controversial remark, Banerjee alleged that some institutions were being politically misused, recalling an incident last year when the Army dismantled a Trinamool Congress protest stage at the Maidan.(PTI)
