West Bengal Assembly Elections 2016: Will electoral officers’ pre-poll report nail Mamata Banerjee government?

The report submitted by the five chief electoral officers talks about political interference in many areas which doesn’t rule out the chances of more heads being rolled

By India.com News Desk on March 24, 2016 

Kolkata, March 24: The ruling Trinamool Congress, led by chief minister Mamata Banerjee, doesn’t have anything to smile on ahead of the West Bengal Assembly Election 2016 that is due in 10 days’ time. The report submitted by the five chief electoral officers talks about political interference in many areas.

“Propriety demands confidentiality. But this much can be said that our report mentions quite a few areas of concern, several problems, largely on account of tremendous political interference at all levels,” a member of a team that covered four south Bengal districts was quoted as saying by Kolkata daily The Telegraph.

The teams have toured all 21 districts they were assigned to cover. Each team comprised a chief electoral officer, an additional or joint chief electoral officer, an IPS officer and two Election Commission officials. The reports have already been filed to the Election Commission of India and the recommendations are expected shortly.

“The reports have been filed. The full bench led by the chief election commissioner (Nasim Zaidi) is going through them. Decisions on the basis of the reports, if any, will be taken over the next couple of days,” a senior member of one of the five teams was quoted as saying in the report.

It is still not clear whether there will be recommendations to remove police officers and administrative staffs, it is certain that some strict measure is in the offing to prevent political intervention while polling.

Earlier, 35 officers have been removed by the commission, including five IPS officers and one IAS officer, from election duty. There is panic in Nabanna, the state secretariat, because of the fact that if more officers are transferred state bureaucrats will get a strong message about their bias towards the dispensation.

“In some districts, the special teams made it clear that they were not satisfied with the preparedness. If this is reflected in their reports, more heads might roll. That would be even more embarrassing for the state,” an official was quoted as saying.