A BJP delegation led by media convener Anil Dhir on Thursday met the State Election Commissioner and urged him to countermand the second phase UlB elections keeping in view the SEC’s castigation on State Finance Minister Prasanna Acharya.
The BJP leaders said that SEC held the Minister guilty of flouting model code of conduct during UlB polls held in Western Odisha in November. Earlier, Mines Minister Rajni Singh, Health Minister Damodar Rout and the Chief Minister himself had violated the poll code by using official machinery, they alleged.
Dhir expressed concerns that the SEC took lightly of the violations and did not take any action against the violators. “This type of attitude of the SEC had given the ruling party a free hand to commit repeated violations,” the party release said, adding, “During the entire elections, the office of the SEC seemed to work as an extension of the ruling BJD.”
The party leaders said the repeated violations and the stark silence of the SEC had resulted in the erosion of the confidence of the people of the State in the Constitutional body. The free and fair polls should be conducted under the active guidance of non partisan observers, they added. Among others, Krushak Morcha spokesperson Pravakar Swain, Sanjay Kumar Sahu and Sarat Kumar Sahu of the Yuba Morcha went with the delegation.