While sources in the State Election Commission office called it “peaceful vote with some stray incidents of violence”, bare eyes saw the spectre of Trinamool Congress’ strongman Anubrata Mandal looming heavy and large over the entire Birbhum district where 11 seats were up for the grab.
Curiously, Mandal, who was interned on Saturday by the EC but moved about defiantly and controlled electioneering from his party control room, was heard directing his lieutenants to see that they did not cross 90 per cent polling — that could provoke re-polling.
On the face of it things looked as placid as still water but beneath there was fierce undercurrent of pent up tension. At ground-level reports from places particularly, Nanoor, luvpur, Mayureshwar, Rampurhat etal said voters and in many cases polling agents were forced to keep indoors, to avoid what Mandal and his men called “post poll beating of drums.”
Elections were held on Sunday for 56 seats across six districts, five of which were in North Bengal and one in South.
Many areas in Nanoor and luvpur saw terrified voters refusing to walk to the polling booth. At Ilambazar the local Trinamool men clashed with the CRPF which lathi-charged to stop rigging. In the melee a jawan arm got fractured.
At many places in Rampurhat, Mayureshwar and Parui BJP and left polling agents were sent back home. “They said that there could be violence in the evening if we stayed back. So we decided to leave,” polling agents at Albanda village in Pauri said.
Mandal’s men also arranged for carrot besides stick dolling out snacks and even lunch for favourable voters besides ferrying them to the booths from villages. Curiously much bandied quick reaction teams had vanished as quickly as they could, sources alleged.
In the evening when Mandal was asked to comment on his being interned (nazarband) he bluntly replied “no one can dare do me so,” directing his men to keep things “under control.” On whether there was any bloodshed he said “if you can achieve the target without spilling blood where is the need of that,” adding many opposition voters who did not like the work of their parties had not come out to vote.
late in the evening CEO sources said an FIR had been filed against Mandal for defying the Commission as also breaking electoral rules by going to vote with a TMC logo stuck on his chest. First Mandal denied having done so before conceding his mistake saying it was done inadvertently.
Another Trinamool leader from Malda Asadul Biswas also interned by the EC however followed instructions and kept indoors.
Malda unlike Birbhum saw some stray violence in places like English Bazaar, Sujapur and Kaliachak where a bomb exploded alleged at a Congress leader’s house. The police were investigating the matter.
Unlike Birbhum in Malda where the left-Congress alliance had better organisation it was the TMC that was on the receiving end with their agents frequently needing doctors ‘attention. Anup Sarkar a TMC agent was hospitalized at Malda Medical College after being beaten up by CPI(M). At Chanchol another TMC agent Asraful had to be hospitalized for similar reasons.
Further north polling seemed to be peaceful in Siliguri, Jalpaiguri, Darjeeling, North Dinajpur and South Dinajpur barring small incidents at Rajganj and Siliguri. In North Dinajpur central forced did excellent job keeping the polling process peaceful. At Itahar a Trinamool agent was arrested for influencing voters with dummy EVM machine.
Meanwhile, CEO sources confirmed about 71 per cent polling by 3 pm which was likely to go up by 10-12 percent by 6-6.30 pm in the evening. About 1.22 crore voters exercised their franchise in 56 constituencies spread across six districts.