West Bengal Poll Violence: Jangipur and Lochanpur Record Scuffle Among Parties' Candidates

Reports of violence have surfaced in West Bengal during the third phase of voting for the 18th Lok Sabha elections. Similar incidents were also noted during the first two phases held on April 19 and April 26 in this eastern state.

Elections are being held for four seats in West Bengal: Malda North, Malda South, Jangipur, and Murshidabad.

The candidates for Malda North are Mostaque Alam from the Congress, Khagen Murmu from the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP), and Prasun Banerjee from the Trinamool Congress (TMC)

In Malda South, the candidates are Isha Khan Choudhury from the Congress, Sreerupa Mitra Chaudhury from the BJP, and Shahnawaz Ali Raihan from the TMC.

For the Jangipur seat, the candidates are Mortaza Hossain Bokul from the Congress, Dhananjay Ghosh from the BJP, and Khalilur Rahaman from the TMC.

In Murshidabad, the candidates are Mohammed Salim from the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), Abu Taher Khan from the TMC, and Gouri Shankar Ghosh from the BJP.

A total of 73,37,651 voters, comprising 36,12,395 women and 154 individuals identifying as belonging to the third gender, are eligible to vote across 7,360 polling stations in these four parliamentary constituencies.

The initial two hours of polling were marked by disturbing incidents of violence, particularly in the Lok Sabha constituencies of Jangipur and Lochanpur in the Murshidabad district. Clashes erupted at polling booths in these areas involving three prominent political parties of the state: the CPI-M, TMC and BJP.

In Lochanpur, Mohammed Salim, the CPI-M candidate, claimed that a person posing as a CPI-M agent was stationed at a polling booth after the actual party representative was allegedly assaulted and forced to leave. This incident reportedly took place in front of central forces at booth number 36 in the Lochanpur area of Raninagar block in the Domkal subdivision. According to Salim, TMC workers occupied the booth, pretending to be CPI-M agents, and the imposter allegedly falsified documents by forging Salim's signature.

Salim mentioned that the genuine CPI-M agent, Mostakin Sheikh, had been hiding in a nearby village called Paharpur, about 3 kilometres away, for approximately an hour. Eventually, arrangements were made for him to return to the booth. Salim himself was observed removing the imposter from the booth.

As per the Election Commission (EC), there was a dispute over the presence of two agents during the mock poll. However, since only one representative per candidate is permitted, the sector officer instructed one of them to leave. However, Salim criticised the TMC, accusing them of intimidating voters, and expressed his dissatisfaction, stating, "People are made to be threatened and scared. Police officers themselves do it. Even on the day of polling, voters are being stopped and threatened..."

Another incident occurred at a polling booth in Jangipur, where a clash broke out between a TMC booth president and BJP candidate Dhananjay Ghosh. Ghosh stated, "As a BJP candidate, I was threatened by the TMC booth agent... If this is how candidates are treated, what about regular people? We will report this to the Election Commission."

TMC leader Gautam Ghosh claimed that Dhananjay Ghosh was intimidating voters. After the confrontation, central forces intervened and removed both leaders from the area.

During the initial two hours of voting, the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) office in West Bengal received a total of 182 complaints, with 99 being officially logged by various political parties. The majority of these complaints, totalling 73, came from the CPI(M).

To oversee the third phase of polling in Bengal, the EC has deployed 334 companies of central forces along with 13,600 state police personnel. This measure aims to ensure that the voting process is conducted freely, fairly, and peacefully.