Kolkata: Barring stray incidents of tension in certain pockets, the polling process in 152 Assembly constituencies in 16 districts of West Bengal has been overall peaceful in the first two hours Thursday, with 18.76 per cent voting recorded till 9 am.
District-wise, the highest polling percentage till 9 am has been recorded in West Midnapore at 20.51 per cent and the lowest in Malda at 16.76 per cent, as per the statistics provided by the office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), West Bengal.
At a polling booth under Raninagar Assembly constituency in minority-dominated Murshidabad district, which had already been earmarked by the Election Commission of India (ECI) as the most sensitive district, tension flared up in the morning, following Congress’s allegations of their polling agent being forcefully evicted from the booth by the ruling Trinamool Congress activists.
The Congress candidate from Raninagar, Zulfikar Ali, alleged that Trinamool Congress- backed hooligans were hiding in a forested area with crude bombs and firearms and intimidating voters going to the polling booths. “They have forcefully evicted one of our agents from that booth,” Ali alleged.
At the two Assembly constituencies of Nandigram and its adjacent Haldia, in East Midnapore district, which is the native district of the Leader of Opposition in the Assembly, Suvendu Adhikari, the Trinamool Congress leadership accused the police officers in charge of the polling duties of deliberately harassing the ruling party supporters following the instructions of Adhikari.
There were scattered protests by the Trinamool Congress workers in both these constituencies.
Adhikari denied the allegations and said that the polling process has been more or less peaceful both in East Midnapore and West Midnapore districts. “They are raising these baseless allegations, sensing their inevitable defeat. Except in Pingla in West Midnapore, there are some tensions because of the role played by the local inspector-in-charge, Chinmoy Pramanik. I have demanded his suspension,” Adhikari said.`
