Kolkata: The Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), Gyanesh Kumar, Monday morning was faced with protests and displays of black flags and “Go-Back” posters by Trinamool Congress activists while he was coming out after offering Puja at the iconic Goddess Kali temple at Kalighat in South Kolkata, which is quite close to the residence of Chief Minister, Mamata Banerjee.
Before attending to his schedule for the two-day visit of the full Bench of the Election Commission of India (ECI), which will start with a series of meetings with the delegations of different registered political parties at 10 AM Monday, Kumar went to the Kalighat temple to offer prayers.
However, as he stepped out of the temple, he was met by protests by Trinamool Congress activists assembled there with black flags and posters with “Go-Black” slogans written on them. The protesting ruling party activists also shouted anti-Kumar and anti-Special Intensive Revision (SIR) slogans.
However, Kumar maintained his cool and left the place with a smiling face. He even refused to give any reaction to the waiting media persons over the protests against him.
“I convey my greetings to all the brothers and sisters of West Bengal. May Goddess Kali bless them all,” CEC Kumar said and remained silent over the media queries about the protests.
In fact, after he arrived in Kolkata Sunday night with other members of the Commission’s full Bench, he also faced protests after coming out of the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport in the city.
Sunday night, the activists of both Trinamool Congress and CPI(M) staged protests separately. The state leadership of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had claimed that this proved that, in reality, there was a clandestine understanding between the Trinamool Congress and the CPI(M) over the SIR issue.
In fact, there is a common point of demand of both the Trinamool Congress and the CPI(M) on the SIR issue. Both parties have urged that the Commission should not announce the polling dates for West Bengal unless the ongoing judicial adjudication of the voters’ documents identified under the “logical discrepancy” category is completed.