Kolkata, Nov 1 (IANS) The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) has urged the Election Commission of India (ECI) about the purported incidents of two block development officers (BDOs) in West Burdwan district of West Bengal allowing the local Trinamool Congress leadership to use their office infrastructure for attending the party’s virtual organisational meeting on Friday, which was chaired by the party’s General Secretary Abhishek Banerjee.
The CPI-M Politburo member and the party’s West Bengal Secretary, Mohammed Salim, had written a letter to the West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), requesting the latter to investigate the matter and accordingly, take appropriate legal actions against the BDOs concerned.
Along with his complaint, Salim had also attached supporting evidence to substantiate the allegations on this count.
“I have requested the CEO of West Bengal to take immediate action against those BDOs. How dare they permit the venue of a party meeting in the BDO offices?” the CPI-M Politburo member asked.
At the virtual organisational meeting chaired by Abhishek Banerjee on Friday, he fixed the organisational responsibilities of the Trinamool Congress leaders, elected responsibilities, members in the state Cabinet, and grassroots-level party workers for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in West Bengal, the first stage of which will start on November 4.
At the meeting, Trinamool Congress General Secretary instructed the booth-level agents (BLAs) of the party to shadow the booth-level officers (BLOs) appointed by the ECI during the SIR exercise.
“At the virtual meeting, it was also decided that Trinamool Congress will open area-wise help desks throughout the state to assist the voters from November 4, and these helpdesks will continue to operate till the entire SIR exercise concludes. There will be a total of 6,200 help desks throughout the state. These helpdesks will operate from November 4 to December 4 daily between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m.,” said a party leader who attended the meeting.
The last time that the SIR was conducted in West Bengal was in 2002.
The current SIR is being conducted with the voters’ list in 2002 being the base.
Since the beginning, the SIR had been a controversial issue in West Bengal.
The Trinamool Congress had described the SIR as an indirect ploy to impose the NRC in West Bengal.
On the other hand, the Bharatiya Janata Party had claimed that Trinamool Congress was opposing the SIR out of the fear that the names of illegal Bangladeshi and Rohingya infiltrators would be deleted from the voters’ list.
–IANS
src/khz