FIR against 30, fresh polls ordered at two polling stations
The Dumka district administration, under scanner for a serious security lapse giving a free run to Maoists to ambush a polling party, on Saturday lodged an FIR against 30 persons along with 15-20 unidentified ones at Shikaripara police station.
The main accused who have been identified are — Praveer, Joseph, Kanchan, luttinath, Simon, Dawood, Kiran, Akash, Dipak, Akash Sudheer, Dewan, Shanti, Sonu, Timpu, Pinki, Pratibha, Shivanti etc. The list of accused persons also includes the names of 10 women rebels.
They have been booked under Section 147, 148, 149, 326, 307, 353, 302, 379, 427, 121 of the Indian Penal Code along with Section 27 of arms act and several other acts of ClA and Explosives Act.
On the other hand, Director General of Police (DGP) Rajiv Kumar holding the local administration responsible for the incident reiterated that anyone found responsible for the same will not be spared at any cost.
“Definitely there has been deviation from the strategy in Dumka which was supposed to be adopted during the voting by the polling parties and any body found responsible for the same will definitely be punished,” said the DGP.
“Despite instructions during the meeting on April 21 in Dumka, not to take any vehicle beyond the cluster point, they boarded the bus leading to the loss of eight lives during the polls,” he added.
According to the DGP, barring Dumka, their strategy had been quite successful during the polls in all the three phases across the State. “It is a clear cut negligence of the local administration which did not follow the guidelines issued by us,” he said.
“We are ascertaining the facts and as soon as the formalities are completed, necessary action will be taken in this regard,” said Kumar.
However, a senior official, requesting anonymity, said that most of the senior administrative and police officers were posted in Dumka ahead of the elections on the basis of “paisa and pairvi” and one should not expect a better result from them. The officer said that the field level cops have become deft in fighting the Maoists. “The incidents, like the one in Bakaro, have happened in those districts only where the senior officers did not undertake adequate security drill,” he pointed out.
The Election Commission, on the other hand, is also waiting for the reports to come to initiate any probe in the case. “We are still to get the reports from Dumka. We will be in a position to speak in the matter only after we get it from the ground,” said Chief Electoral Officer PK Jajoria.
On the question of fixing the responsibility of the district administration for the incident, Jajoria said that if they think that it was a lapse committed by the local administration, they must take immediate actions against the SP who was in-charge of the district. Jajoria however, did not comment on the fixing responsibility on anybody without getting all details on the issue.
Meanwhile, the Election Commission, announcing re-poll on April 28 at polling stations no. 100 and 101, cancelled the polling which took place on April 24. According to an official release of the Commission, polling is to take place from 7 am to 3 pm.
Eight persons, including five policemen and three members of polling party were killed, while several others were injured when Maoists, upset with the high turnout of voters defying their diktat in Santhal Pargana, triggered a landmine near Asna village blowing up a bus carrying them back to Shikaripara after conducting the elections on Thursday evening.