EC personnel beaten up while videographing TMC bike rally in Malda

Two Election Commission personnel were on Thursday beaten up while they were videographing a bike rally by Trinamool workers at Manikchak in Malda district, inviting the ire of the poll body which has directed authorities to initiate stern action against the accused and file a report on the incident.

Bike rallies are prohibited during election campaign under EC rules.

District election office sources said that the video footage would be examined before filing of any official complaint. EC director Dhirendra Ojha said in Kolkata that the poll body had taken a serious note of the incident and asked the district administration to submit report of the incident by Thursday evening.

It also asked the district magistrate to submit a detailed report of  the incident and the action-taken-report to the Commission by Thursday evening.

Eyewitnesses claimed that a four-member team of EC personnel were taking the video footage of the rally as it approached Khayertala of Manikchak when some people from the crowd objected and beat two of them. The sources said that the block development officer would be probing the incident.

The police, when contacted, said it was yet to get any report of the incident. Top Commission officials, who met in New Delhi, took serious view of the incident and gave directions to the district magistrate of Malda to take immediate stern action against the offenders.

In a recent meeting attended by Deputy EC Vinod Zutshi, poll officials from West Bengal had expressed fear of violence targeting them during the elections.

The EC had taken a serious note of their complaints and the issue had also come up during a meeting of Chief Election Commissioner V S Sampath and other top EC officials with the state authorities in Kolkata last week, according to the sources.

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