Based on intelligence inputs, the State police during meetings cautioned the Election Commission of India (ECI) that Left Wing Extremist (LWE) groups may deploy new tactics to sabotage the election process in Jharkhand this year, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sunil Arora said on Thursday – his first ever statement highlighting State officials’ inputs on the security concerns during polls here.
“There are possibilities that the LWE groups may use new tactics and ways to sabotage the elections process, the state police told us,” said Arora, adding that the decision of conducting elections in five phases was taken on the basis of the report of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and inputs from the law enforcement agencies in Jharkhand.
An MHA report released in February 2019 said that 19 of 24 districts in Jharkhand were LWE-affected and 13 of them were extremely sensitive. Perhaps the presence of banned rebel outfits here was one of the major reasons for the ECI to stretch the voting process to almost a month – a decision that has left many opposition parties unhappy in the tribal State. Ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was the only political organization that sought elections in five phases here citing law and order concerns. All the remaining regional and national parties requested ECI to conduct elections in one phase for the 81 Assembly constituencies here. ECI decided to hold elections here in five phases from November 30 to December 20.