Assam assembly polls: State ready with star nominees

image-30-assam-map.jpg news.oneindia.in}Guwahati, Mar 30: This week has completed the nomination process of Assam Assembly election 2011 where more than 500 candidates contesting in 64 seats have filed their nominations. Many high profile leaders, dissident leaders, party deserters had filed nominations with fan fare in their respective constituencies.

Few highlights include nominations filed by Himanta Biswa Sarma, Rockybul Hussain of Congress, Chandra Mohan Patowari, Prafulla Kumar Mahanta of AGP, Pradyut Bora of BJP among others. Here are few interesting Assam Election related incidents for last week :-

1. Guwahati High Court asks Election Commission to debar Voting by D-Voters

Guwahati High court has directed Election Commission to debar 'D" voters from casting their votes in the election. There are 4,06,451 D-Voters ( illegal Bangladeshi migrants ) in Assam as per Government affidavit and High Court observed that allowing such an exercise was fraught with far-reaching consequences on the State"s socio-political front.
The Congress Government has indicated that they would appeal against the HC directive. Many opine that Congress is likely to lose votes in case D-Voters are not allowed to vote.

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2. Himanta Biswa Sarma filed nomination from Jalukbari

Himanta Biswa Sarma had filed his nomination from Jalukbari Constituency as Congress candidate with many supporters in DC Court, Panbazar, Guwahati. During the filing of his nomination, many supporters ( 25,000 as per NewsLive TV) went with him while Himanta Biswa Sarma traveled on an open truck ( like cheap villain of B Grade Hindi Movie as per Asomiya Pratidin headline).
There were allegation on violation of model code of conduct for elections and The District Election Officer of Kamrup (Metro) Dr J Balaji today issued a show-cause notice to him. There are also reports of stone pelting by his supporters to police standing in DC court, and CRPF had to resort to mild lathi-charge to control the unruly supporters.

Akhil Gogoi has also demanded cancellation of nomination of Himanta Biswa Sarma for violating model poll conduct.

3. Top Leaders of National Parties have arrived in Assam for campaigning

BJPs top leaders like Arun Jaitly, Digvijay Singh ad Vijay Goel had arrived in Assam for campaigning for BJP candidates. Hema Malin, BJP Rajya Sabha member from Karnataka had also arrived to campaign for BJP candidates in Assam.

PM Manmohan Singh, a resident and Rajya Sabha MP from Assam was supposed to arrive on Mar 28, 2011 but was rescheduled after ULFA call for Assam Bandh on the same day.

4. Paid News and Nagaon Talks channel sealed

Paid news has become buzz word in Assam election where BJP and AGP had been making allegation of Paid news aired by NewsLive TV owned by wife of Himanta Biswa Sarma. In another incident, Election commission officials have sealed Nagaon Talks channel in Nagaon which is owned by Congress MLA Rockybul Hussain who is contesting from Samguri constituency.

Another seven days remain for the first phase of the voting on 4th April 2011. There were also reports of some poll related violence in Silapathar in Dhemaji district and Dhakuakhana in Lakhimpur District between Congress and Gana Shakti supporters.

Courtesy: Northeastblog.in