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West Bengal Panchayat Election 2023: The Calcutta High Court said on Wednesday, July 12, that the results of the West Bengal Panchayat elections will depend on the final order of the court. The High Court has directed the State Election Commission (SEC), the state government and the central government to file affidavits while hearing petitions alleging rigging in elections.
Hearing of petitions regarding re-polling
Several petitions have been filed in the High Court regarding the Panchayat elections held on July 8 in the state. In these petitions, alleging large-scale violence and rigging in the elections, a request has been made to direct re-polling in about 50,000 polling stations. Earlier, the State Election Commission conducted re-polling at 696 polling stations and the counting of votes took place on July 11.
During the hearing, one of the petitioners had shown a video as evidence of alleged rigging on the day of polling. The court has directed the petitioner to provide a copy of the video to the state election commission, the state government and the central lawyers by Wednesday. The High Court has fixed July 19 as the next date of hearing.
High Court angry with the attitude of State Election Commission
The hearing bench expressed displeasure towards the State Election Commission and said that prima facie it appears that the reply of the commission is not adequate and on Wednesday also none of its officials were present in the court to give necessary instructions to their lawyers.< /p>
The court said, ‘‘It is not clear why the commission is not already active, especially when the court is monitoring the entire process and the first judgment was pronounced on June 13.’’ The court had issued a series of guidelines for conducting the three-tier panchayat elections in a free and fair manner. The bench said that it is surprising that even after the announcement of the election results, the state is not able to stop the violence. The court said, ‘‘If the state government is not in a position to protect its citizens then it is a very serious matter.’
Based on PTI inputs
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