Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Priyanka Tibrewal and Left Front candidate Srijib Biswas on Monday filed their nominations for the Bhabanipur bypoll. Mr. Biswas is contesting on the ticket of the CPI(M).
The two candidates are up against Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee who filed her papers on September 10. The Chief Minister also took part in the campaign and spoke to voters in Ekbalpur area.
Ms. Tibrewal was accompanied by Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari and BJP Lok Sabha MP Arjun Singh. Mr. Adhikari, who had contested against the Chief Minister in Nandigram and defeated her by a margin of 1,956 votes, urged the voters to elect Ms. Tibrewal.
Later in the day, the BJP wrote a letter to the Election Commission of India demanding free and fair elections in the Samserganj, Jangipur and Bhabanipur Assembly seats. It sought deployment of the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) at all polling booths. It urged the ECI to transfer officers posted for more than three years and said no officer of the State government should be employed on poll duty since the employees’ union has openly pledged its support to Ms. Banerjee.
In the 2021 Assembly polls, TMC candidate Sovandeb Chattopadhyay won the seat by a margin of about 27,000 votes. He resigned paving way for Ms. Banerjee to contest the bypoll. Ms. Banerjee represented the constituency in 2011 and 2016.
During the day, the Calcutta High Court heard a PIL challenging the bypolls. The division bench of Acting Chief Justice Rajesh Bindal asked why the petition was filed long after the ECI’s announcement. The matter will come up for hearing again on September 20. The bypolls to the three seats are scheduled to be held on September 30.
