According to a senior official in the office of the Chief Electoral Officer around 30,000 complaints were lodged with the Commission through various means the most of which have been found to be baseless.
The official said: “We have so far received more than 30,000 complaints by various political parties, media and the people in general among which more than 20,000 complaints were found to be bogus. The Commission has painstakingly gone through each and every complaint raised by various political parties. The complaints which were found to be true were addressed by the Commission immediately. The concerned election officials were asked to take prompt action”.
The Commission for the first time received so many false complaints. From the first day of polls various Opposition parties started registering complaints with the Samadhan application introduced by the Commission. In all the six phases of election the Opposition parties including CPI(M) were found to have lodged complaints that eventually proved to be false.
In all the poll phases CPI(M) leaders alleged that their workers were beaten up by Trinamool Congress activists while in some cases they alleged that CPI(M) polling agents were driven out of the booths. But when senior election officials reached the spot they found that the allegations were false.
Some people, however, believe that CPI(M) tried to mount pressure on the Election Commission by registering false complaints. Registering complaints with the Commission had become easier in this election as the Election Commission of India had introduced mobile applications through which people could lodge complaints. The CPI(M) leaders and Opposition parties have utilised the opportunity to register baseless complaints against the ruling party.
In a very recent incident, the senior CPI(M) leader Surya Kanta Mishra had brought false charges against Subhedu Adhikary, the Trinamool Congress candidate from Nandigram. Mishra had alleged that Adhikary held meetings with the officers in charge of various police stations.
On basis of the complaint the ECI had sought a report from the district election officer. After going through the matter the Commission found that no such meetings had taken place between Adhikary and officers in charge of the police stations. On the basis of the complaint lodged by the BJP, the ECI had instructed a probe to verify the tower locations of Adhikary and the police officers.
After a thorough verification the election officials have found that allegations were utterly baseless and they would submit a report to the Commission in this regard.