EC team to visit West Bengal to assess poll readiness

New Delhi: A high-level team of the Election Commission of India led by a deputy election commissioner will be in West Bengal, Assam, Tripura and Manipur in the coming days to assess poll preparedness, official sources said Thursday.

The decision to send Deputy Election Commissioner Sudip Jain comes a day after the BJP urged the poll watchdog to declare West Bengal a “super sensitive state”.

Mr Jain will lead the team to West Bengal on Saturday, Tripura on Sunday, Assam on Monday and Manipur on Tuesday to assess election preparedness in the four states.

 While Lok Sabha elections in West Bengal are spread across all the seven phases, they will be held in two phases each in Tripura and Manipur and three in Assam.

Sources in the EC said that the chief electoral officer of West Bengal has also been asked to file a report on the actual ground situation.

The BJP had on Wednesday also demanded that central forces be deployed at all polling stations in the TMC ruled state.

Briefing the media after meeting EC officials, Law Minister and BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad had said, “We have requested the Election Commission that the state of West Bengal should be declared as super-sensitive. And have also demanded that central forces should be deployed at all polling booths in the state.”

He said the party also requested the poll panel to transfer those police officers whose electoral impartiality is questionable as well as the withdrawal of former Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar from election duty.

The BJP is trying to make inroads into Trinamool Congress’ bastion of West Bengal which has 42 Lok Sabha seats. In 2014, the Trinamool Congress (TMC) won 34 seats, the Congress four, while the BJP and CPI(M) bagged two seats each in the state.

Slamming the BJP for moving the poll panel, Chief Minister and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee alleged the saffron party was trying to hide behind central forces as it can’t win any seat in the state.