West Bengal panchayat poll: An unidentified man ran with a ballot box in Cooch Behar district of West Bengal. The polling for the panchayat poll elections is underway. In the video, it can be seen that a person is running away with a ballot box. The incident has raised questions about the police, administration and security system in the state.
A ballot box at a polling booth in Baranachina of Dinhata in Cooch Behar district was also set on fire allegedly by voters who were angry with bogus voting that was reportedly going on here.
Voting underway
The single-phased panchayat elections are underway in West Bengal. These elections are being seen as a test of the political parties ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Nearly 5.67 crore voters are likely to cast their votes to elect their representatives at the local level for about 928 seats spread across 22 zilla parishads, 9,730 panchayat Samiti, and 63,239-gram panchayats seats.
There are 341 gram panchayats in West Bengal while the number of village panchayat election centres is 58,594. There are 63,239 seats at the Gram Panchayat level, 9730 at Panchayat Samiti and 928 at the Zila Parishad level. The TMC, in 2018, had won uncontested with 34 per cent of the seats in the panchayat elections, which also witnessed violence.
9 dead in violence
At least nine people were killed in election-related violence in West Bengal. Among those killed were five TMC members, and one worker each of the BJP, CPI(M) and Congress, and the supporter of an Independent candidate.
(Report by Sujit Das)
