Bengal bypolls: Bagda to have maximum CAPF deployment among four Assembly seats

Kolkata, June 13 (IANS) The Election Commission of India (ECI) has announced a breakup of the Central Armed Police Forces personnel (CAPF) deployment for the bypolls to the four Assembly constituencies in West Bengal on July 10 with the maximum to be in Bagda in North 24 Parganas district.

Sources in the office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) said that of the 55 companies to be deployed, the maximum will be at Bagda at 16, following Ranaghat-Dakshin in Nadia district at 15.

In the case of Raiganj in North Dinajpur district and Maniktala in Kolkata, 12 companies will be deployed for each.

The deployment is made based on the degree of sensitivity in terms of law and order situation. As per the records, the Bagda Assembly seat is the most sensitive among the four constituencies.

The Commission has decided to use EVMs and VVPATs in the bypolls in all the polling stations and for that purpose, adequate numbers of the machines have been made available and all steps have been taken to ensure that the polling is conducted smoothly with the help of these machines, sources said.

The gazette notification for the bypolls will be issued on Friday and the last date for filing of nomination by the candidates will be June 21. The last date of withdrawal of nominations will be June 26 and the counting of votes will be July 13.

The bye-election at Maniktala was necessitated by the demise of the erstwhile Trinamool Congress legislator from there Sadhan Pande.

In the other three constituencies, the erstwhile BJP legislators, namely Biswajit Das from Bagda, Dr Mukut Mani Adhikari from Ranaghat- Dakshin and Krishna Kalyani from Raiganj, all of whom got elected in 2021, had to resign from Assembly as they contested Lok Sabha election as Trinamool Congress candidates.

Although all three of them got defeated this time, bypolls need to be conducted in these three Assembly constituencies from where they had resigned.

According to statistics from the office of the CEO, in terms of the results of the recently concluded Lok Sabha polls, the BJP is in a stronger position in Bagda, Ranaghat-Dakshin and Raiganj, while Trinamool Congress is better placed in Maniktala.