West Bengal Elections: 9 Bombs Discovered 200m from Cooch Behar Polling Booth

KOLKATA: Amid the ongoing Lok Sabha elections, police in West Bengal discovered at least nine bombs located 200 meters from a voting station in the village of Falimari, within the Cooch Behar district.

Earlier in the day, a bomb was found in a village within the Dinhata area of Cooch Behar.

Additionally, there are claims that workers affiliated with the Trinamool Congress hurled bombs at the residence of the BJP booth president in the same vicinity.

As soon as the voting for the first phase of the Lok Sabha Election began in three out of 42 parliamentary seats in West Bengal, there were immediate reports of conflicts between the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

TMC and BJP indicted each other of intimidating voters and assaulting booth agents. In areas like Toofanganj in Cooch Behar and Dabgram – Fulbari in Jalpaiguri, temporary election offices were allegedly set on fire.

Officials in the West Bengal governor’s office said that most of the calls related to the election violence and voter intimidation same from Cooch Behar.

The first phase of the Lok Sabha elections began today and voting was underway in three major constituencies of West Bengal including Cooch Behar, Alipurduar and Jalpaiguri.

The ruling TMC accused BJP of orchestrating violence in the state. The party alleged that the BJP chief Nishit Pramanik used his position to stockpile weapons in his office. The party has also written to the Election Commission in this regard.

TMC leader Dr Santanu Sen said, “The work of governor is to work as Constitutional head, however, what we see as they work on the behest of BJP…In West Bengal, the law and order situation is good comparatively other states…If the EC stays neutral and provides a level playing field to all, then here elections will take place peacefully…Governor has been used to disturb the state government.”

As per the ECI officials, the statewide turnout has been 60%. Opinion polls in three key constituencies were also closely watched. Cooch Behar had 65.58%, Alipurduar 66.23% and Jalpaiguri  67.28%.

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