Ichha Sharma, Pune
West Bengal was still experiencing occasional demonstrations and post-election occurrences of violence when the State Election Commission declared on Sunday that re-voting would take place on July 10 in 696 booths wherein voting for the provincial elections had been certified valid.
Revoting started at 7 a.m. on Monday in 696 booths spread across 19 districts in West Bengal where casting voting for the panchayat elections had been called off due to claims of ballot box tampering and violence that claimed 15 lives, according to officials. They stated that in addition to state police, four members of the central forces would be stationed at each of those booths throughout the re-voting, which would take place until 5 p.m.
A leader of the BJP’s youth wing in Tamluk, Tamas Dinda said, “We received information around 3 am that the ballot boxes were being changed. We are demanding re-polling at all the booths in the area under the protection of central forces, besides counting of votes at the booths itself,” According to Manoj Kumar Jha, officer-in-charge of Nandakumar police station, as the situation deteriorated, officers baton-charged the demonstrators to bring it under control. This was reported for the situation on Sunday.
With 175, Murshidabad, one of the districts where reelection was taking place, has the most booths, ahead of Malda with 109. Re-voting was also taking place at 89 booths in Nadia. Cooch Behar was next with 53, North 24 Parganas with 46, Uttar Dinajpur with 42, South 24 Parganas with 36, Purba Medinipur with 31 and Hooghly with 29 booths, according to officials.
In the districts of Darjeeling, Jhargram, and Kalimpong, no re-voting was mandated, they claimed. The State Election Commission (SEC), after assessing allegations of assault and manipulation with voting machines and ballot papers, decided to rerun the election in these 696 booths, they stated.
In excess of 61,000 polling places hosted voting on Saturday to hold the three-tier panchayat polls. The violence resulted from the looting, setting on fire, and dumping of ballot boxes in ponds in a number of locations. The selection of 2.06 lakh nominees for 73,887 panchayat seats was up to a total of 5.67 crore individuals living in rural parts of the state.