Bengal: Legal Experts and Ex-Judges Hold State EC Responsible for Panchayat Poll Deaths

Kolkata: Legal experts and former Justices of the Calcutta High Court have held the State Election Commission responsible for the huge number of deaths during the 10th Panchayat elections in West Bengal.

Speaking at a seminar titled "Challenges to Indian Democracy", they said that the onus of so many deads lies with the State Election Commission (SEC), which did not function according to the rule book and the mandated constitutional role expected from an impartial election commission.

Former justice Samaresh Banerjee presided over the programme. Jayanta Mitra, legal expert and former Advocate General of the Government of West Bengal, took exception to the role played by the SEC in the Panchayat polls.

Mitra said that the SEC is an independent and the highest body when the election process takes place in the state. The sole onus of having a fair and just election lies with the State Election Commissioner. For a free and fair election, he can ask the state government for logistical support, which the government is bound to give. Otherwise, the commissioner can even move the court, Mitra added. "With the commissioner lies the responsibility of protecting the polling staff. However, in our state, about 55 persons have died in the violence whose responsibility the election commission cannot shirk," he said.

Former justice of Calcutta High Court, Ranjit Kumar Bag said that during the election times, the ruling party of the state used the police and civil servants in a wrong manner, which is not at all desirable.

In his speech at the seminar, Justice Samaresh Banerjee said that democracy in the country was facing many serious challenges. "If it is not countered properly, then democracy will be tarnished in our country. It is the people who have to protest against the misdeeds of the ruling party. if the ruling party misuses its power, then the door of the court is always open," he said. 

In the seminar, the anti-judiciary speech of TMC MP and party general secretary Abhishek Banerjee was also strongly criticised. The former judges and the legal experts felt that if Banerjee had any problem with any judgement, he could go to the higher court for redressal; instead, he has been criticising the judiciary.

 NewsClick also spoke with advocate and CPI(M) MP Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya MP and senior Advocate of Kolkata High Court, who said that since 2011, when the TMC came to power in the state, they have been snatching away the democratic rights of people to vote and carry out political work. "It is a fact that they are trying to bring in an autocratic, fascistic belief amidst the people. Even the elections to the school committees and cooperatives were fudged," he claimed.

In the 2018 Panchayat polls, there was full-fledged alleged rigging. The Left had been advocating for mass resistance to the purported rigged polls, which was ultimately reflected in 2023. In this election, there are special features as the Calcutta high court intervened in the polling process time and again. The Left vote has increased in these elections despite all odds, the experts noted, adding that there has been manipulation of the polling process. There has been a massive criminalisation by the TMC, which is no different than the centrally ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, which people have started to understand, they said.