TMC sweeps Bengal rural polls with more than half the seats; BJP distant 2nd

The ruling Trinamool Congress on Wednesday inched closer to a sweeping victory in West Bengal's violence-scarred rural polls, bagging more than half the seats and leaving its rivals trailing way behind in results declared till 9.30 pm by the State Election Commission.

The TMC has won 34,980 gram panchayat seats, besides leading in 570 seats, according to the SEC. In all, elections were held for 63,229 gram panchayat seats.

The ruling party's nearest rival Bharatiya Janata Party has won 9,735 seats and is leading in 142 seats.

The CPI-M has won 2,940 and is leading in 65 seats. The Congress won 2,549 seats and is leading in 62.

The TMC won 6,467 panchayat samiti seats while leading in 184 seats. The BJP has won 990 and is leading in 48 seats, while the CPI-M has won 182 seats and is leading in 13 and Congress has won 267 seats and is leading in 6 seats. Elections were held for 9,728 panchayat samiti seats.

The TMC has also won 685 zila parishad seats so far and is leading in 144 others; with this it seems set to repeat its 2018 performance of controlling all the zila parishads, despite marginally better showing by the BJP and CPI-M-Congress alliance in some districts.

The BJP has in contrast won 21 and is leading in six seats. The CPI-M has won two seats, while Congress has won six and is leading in five. In all, there are 928 zila parishad seats.

Counting of votes for the three-tier panchayat polls began at 8 am on Tuesday at 339 venues spread across 22 districts.

The counting is over though it will take some more time to upload the results on the SEC website, an official said.

In Bhangore in South 24 Parganas, three persons including two activists of the Indian Secular Front (ISF) were killed and several others injured in a clash which took place outside a counting booth late Tuesday night, police said on Wednesday.

A 24-year-old Congress worker was beaten to death on Wednesday while several others were injured after a clash between TMC and Congress supporters in Rampur village in Malda district, police said.

The TMC also claimed that a party worker from South 24 Parganas district's Chandpasha village was hacked to death by "BJP goons".

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday said she is saddened at the loss of lives in "sporadic" incidents of violence during rural polls.

"I am saddened at the loss of lives in sporadic incidents of violence during panchayat elections... The polls were held in 71,000 booths, but incidents of violence took place in not more than 60 booths," she said.

The chief minister claimed that 19 people, mostly from her TMC, died in poll-related violence since the election date was announced on June 8.

Police sources, however, have put the number of fatalities at 38 but agree that at least 60 per cent of those who lost their lives were affiliated with the TMC.

Allegations of vote tampering and violence by various parties forced the SEC to order re-polling in 696 seats on Monday, which passed more or less peacefully. Intervention by the Calcutta High Court had seen the deployment of central police forces on both election and counting days.

Though Bengal has a long history of violent rural polls with 40 people killed in one single day of polling during the 2003 panchayat elections, this year's violence which was covered extensively by the media and focused national attention on it.

The elections are being closely watched by all parties as an indicator of which way the wind will blow in the 2024 parliamentary elections from this part of the country.

State Congress chief Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said the election has already been reduced to a farce.

"According to our apprehension, violence, nexus between the ruling party, police, and the state election commission and unprecedented violence has led to the death of more than 40 persons. After the counting, post-poll violence will be unleashed," he said.

BJP MP Ravi Shankar Prasad who arrived in Kolkata on Wednesday leading a fact-finding team, said, "Violence and killings during rural polls are unacceptable. So many people have been killed; why have so many people had to die in this election? We will visit the violence-hit areas of north and south Bengal. Later, we will submit our report to our national president JP Nadda.”

 All the counting venues are manned by armed state police personnel and central forces, with prohibitory orders under Section 144 of CrPC being imposed outside the venue to avoid any untoward incidents.