Given the sanctity of EC and the set of rules which bind political parties and governments during elections, wouldn’t it be better to ban Banerjee and her party TMC from contesting elections than postponing the poll date?
We call her didi, but she owns the stage of dadagiri in political business. Sometimes she pulls a stunt or two on the centre, rest of the time poor West Bengal janata becomes her prakopbhajan. Mamata di is unique like that.
But this time, she has crossed all her limits. She has gone against the Election Commission for ordering transfer of a district magistrate and five superintendent of police in the state and announcing their replacements.
Didi is adamant on “not accepting” the decision of the commission and has warned that she would not be “responsible” for any “chaos” if the EC meddled with the law and order. She has even dared the Election Commission to “initiate action” against her for not transferring government officers as per its instruction.
Not only that, she alleged that the EC, along with other parties, was hatching a “conspiracy” against her. “…there is a conspiracy hatched by the EC, the Central government, the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party. But I will fight it alone — I do not care about conspiracies,” she told a crowd of several thousands in Hoogli.
The height of her insanity touched sky limits when she claimed that the EC has drawn an election schedule to ensure the victory of Congress leaders. “I have never heard that election is continuing for more than two months and one district is witnessing election in two separate phases. That has been done so that the election could be rigged,” she claimed.
However, she said that she respected the EC but instantly added that the EC “should also respect others.”
The state is going to poll in five phases starting from April 17.
From today morning, the reports came pouring that the EC is mulling over cancelling the polls in the state and rescheduling it to later. It even delivered the threat to Banerjee and has given her time till 2:30 pm to transfer the five police officials that it had ordered to be shifted.
By noon, the West Bengal government of Banerjee had written a letter seeking clarification from the EC on its directive to transfer the five police officials. The state chief secretary has written to the Election Commission that the transfers can’t be enforced by the election body.
With the EC deadline nearing, it will be interesting to see who blinks first.
But given the sanctity of EC and the set of rules which bind political parties and governments during elections, wouldn’t it be better to ban Banerjee and her party TMC from contesting elections than postponing the poll date?
