Re-polling held peacefully in 573 booths across state

Kolkata: Re-polling was conducted in as many as 573 booths across the state on Wednesday, with no major incident of violence being reported. The polling percentage stood at 68 till 5 pm, an official of the State Election Commission (SEC) said.

According to the official, the commission has received some complaints regarding the re-poll, which they are verifying. The SEC has also sought a report from the District Magistrate of North Dinajpur over the mysterious death of a presiding officer, whose body was found beside a railway track in Raiganj.

Polls were conducted in around 46,404 booths on Monday. Re-polls were conducted after the commission received complaints of irregularities in some booths.

Security arrangement was tightened in all the polling stations on the day of re-polling. In some places, the police personnel chased outsiders who tried to intimidate the voters. The SEC has been scrutinising the complaints regarding some stray incidents.

The SEC has assured that the counting will be conducted in around 291 counting stations, amidst tight security on Thursday. The procedure will start at around 8 am on Thursday. There will be 3 layers of security arrangement in and around the counting centres. Section 144 CrPC has been imposed within 200 meter radius of all the counting stations.

The inner portions of the counting centres will be guarded by armed police. Counting stations have been set up at block offices, schools and colleges. SEC has imposed a restriction on the use of mobile phone for the poll employees and the counting agents of various political parties. Apart from a few senior SEC officials, nobody will be allowed to enter the counting premises.

A senior official of the SEC said that there will be 2-3 rounds of counting in each tier. The commission has issued instructions to all the District Magistrates, asking them not to allow any procession during the counting process. The political parties will be allowed to take out victory processions only when the counting process gets completed.

Meanwhile, it may be mentioned that the Centre has written to the state government, seeking another report on poll violence. According to sources, the Centre was not happy over the earlier report, which it had termed as "sketchy".