CEC holds sparate meetings with political leaders in Bengal

Kolkata, Mar 21: Chief Election Commissioner B B Tandon, who arrived here today on a two day visit to examine the pre-poll arrangements in West Bengal,held separate meetings with the CPI(M), Congress and BJP state leaders to ascertain their views.

Mr Tandon who is accompanied by Election Commissioner N Gopalswami and Deputy Election Commissionwer R Balakrishnan,met CPI(M) Chief Whip in the West Bengal Assembly Robin Deb,Congress general secretary Manas Bhunia and BJP state president Tathagata Roy for over an hour and listened to their views about poll preparations.

Senior representatives of all other contesting political parties in West Bengal are scheduled to meet the Commission during the day.

Before leaving for Guwahati tomorrow the three-member Commission, including Mr Navin Chawla,who is yet to arrive,will hold separate meetings with all the District Magistrates,Superintendents of Police and the district Collectors besides Chief Secretary Amit Kiran Deb and Home Secretary Prasad Ranjan Roy to ascertain the latest arrangements for ensuring free and fair polls.

State Chief Electoral Officer Debashis Sen will also be present in the meetings.

Incidentally,during the five phase elections in West Bengal on April 17, 22, 27 and May 02 and 08 the EC has decided to despatch 358 observers for the 294 assembly constituencies. Of these 298 would be general observers and remaining 64 are financial observers.

UNI