TMC inches closer to sweeping Bengal rural polls, bags nearly 35,000 gram panchayat seats
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Kolkata: 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 BJP 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 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 6 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 on Wednesday here 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.
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Death of 10 elephants in MP: Samples being sent to UP for probe; CM chairs high-level meet
Bhopal (PTI): Samples collected in connection with the death of 10 elephants in three days in Madhya Pradesh's Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve are being sent to ICAR-Indian Veterinary Research Institute in Uttar Pradesh and a forensic laboratory in Sagar, officials have said.
Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Mohan Yadav on Friday chaired a high-level meeting during which the government decided to send a state minister and top forest officials to Umaria to probe the elephant deaths, they said.
Meanwhile, a senior veterinarian linked to the probe cited staffers at the reserve and said the elephants fell to the ground and shivered before dying.
On Tuesday, four wild elephants were found dead in Sankhani and Bakeli under Khitoli range of the Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve (BTR), while four died on Wednesday and two on Thursday.
Talking to PTI on Friday over phone from the BTR, Additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forest (Wildlife) L Krishnamoorthy said, "We are sending all the samples we have collected from the field and also organs, like viscera, liver, kidney, etc to the IVRI in Izatnagar in UP's Bareilly as well as the MP forensic laboratory in Sagar."
He heads the five-member committee appointed by the state government to probe the death of the tuskers in Bandhavgarh, which is spread across Umaria and Katni districts in eastern Madhya Pradesh.
Krishnamoorthy had earlier said samples (viscera) of the elephants were sent to Jabalpur-based School of Wildlife Forensic and Health (SWFH) to find out toxins, if any, and the cause of death.
He was responding to a query on whether the elephants had consumed poisonous pesticides sprayed in the field.
"Only after the reports come in we can arrive at a conclusion on the cause of the death. Post mortem reports suspect it could be due to Kodo millets," MP Principal Chief Conservator of Forest (PCCF-Wildlife) VKN Ambade told PTI.
Citing staffers at the BTR, a senior veterinarian said the pachyderms fell to the ground and shivered before dying.
A ground duty officer said the forest department has identified six farmers from whose field the jumbos ate kodo millets, adding reports will clarify if any pesticide was mixed or sprayed on the crop.
Meanwhile, a five-member team of Delhi-based Wildlife Crime Control Bureau continued their probe into the deaths on the second day on Friday.
Officials said the Nagpur-based regional officer of the National Tiger Conservation Authority, assistant inspector general of forests Nandkishore Kale, continued his investigations at the BTR.
"The state tiger strike force also visited nearby agricultural lands, paddy fields, water bodies etc in connection with the kodo millets. All the dead elephants were part of a herd of 13. One of the dead elephants was male. The remaining three in the herd are healthy. They are being monitored," another official said.
Krishnamoorthy earlier said veterinarians had suggested chances of (presence of) mycotoxins associated with kodo millets.
Mycotoxins generate cyclopiazonic acid that causes poisoning in kodo millets, he said.
The forest department's wildlife veterinarians are consulting experts of Indian Veterinary Research Institute (IVRI) Bareilly, Wildlife Institute of India (WII) Dehradun, State Forensic Science Laboratory, Sagar, and Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) Hyderabad to get details about the mycotoxins, he said.
The Special Investigation Team (SIT) and special task force are investigating the case from all angles, the official added.
The Krishnamoorthy-led panel has been asked to submit its report in 10 days.
Some wildlife experts said it may be the first instance in the country when 10 elephants have died in a span of three days.
Talking about the meeting chaired by CM Yadav, an official said, "The government has decided to send minister of state for forests Dileep Ahirwar, additional chief secretary (forest) Ashok Barnwal and the state's head of forest force (HOFF) Aseem Shrivastava to Umaria district to probe the elephant deaths. They will submit their report in 24 hours."
"Strict action will be taken against the guilty. The meeting was also attended by state chief secretary Anurag Jain and Rajesh Rajora, additional chief secretary to the chief minister," he added.
