Trinamool's closest rival, the BJP, won 9,719 gram panchayat seats in Bengal.
The Trinamool Congress sweep in Bengal's rural elections has been subject to a hiccup the final order of the Calcutta High Court, that's hearing a bunch of petitions on poll-related violence and alleged electoral malpractices.Here are the top 10 Points in this big story:
"When the court is seized of the matter, it goes without saying that whatever has been done thus far, i.e, the conduct of the elections and the declaration of results, will be subject to the ultimate orders that may be passed in this writ petition," the High Court said today.
Alleging large-scale violence and electoral malpractice the petitioners had sought repolling in around 50,000 booths. It was conducted in 696 booths.
The Trinamool Congress has won 34,901 of the 63,229 gram panchayat seats, 6,430 panchayat samiti seats and 674 zila parishad seats.
Trinamool's closest rival, the BJP, won 9,719 gram panchayat seats. The CPI(M) has won 2,938 and the Congress 2,542 seats. The counting is still on.
The close to 40 deaths since the day of the elections were declared, has taken the sheen off the Trinamool victory. The counting day tended with bullets flying in Bhangar in South 24 Parganas, in which one person died and a police officer sustained injuries.
In Murshidabad's Raghunathganj and Shamsherganj, located in the district where seven people died since Friday, bombs were hurled this afternoon.
Pointing to the violence that took place in the run-up to the polls and after, senior BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad said, "The BJP had a clean sweep in Uttar Pradesh, but there were hardly any instances of violence across the state". Elected candidates, he alleged, were asked to join Trinamool and told they would not receive their certificate otherwise.
Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee lashed out in response. "I want to ask these incompetent leaders of the BJP -- those who don't have the courage to fight us... In Uttar Pradesh when elections are not held in 67 per cent seats, where are they? I am sad that Ram, Baam and Shyam these three plus one, four people formed an alliance. Maha Vote. They had planned to create trouble," she said.
"if you look at the history of last 25 to 30 years, you will see there is violence in those spots only. In Domkal, there was violence, and our worker was killed. Who won? The Opposition. In Bhangar there was violence. Who did it? Opposition… The election has taken place in a total of 71000 booths and incidents have taken place in how many? Around 60 booths maximum?" Ms Banerjee said.
A BJP fact-finding team headed by Mr Prasad is in Bengal to look into the violence and allegations of malpractice. Last week, Governor CV Ananda Bose also flew to Delhi to briefed Union Home Minister Amit Shah on the matter.
Advertisement
