Specify If Sufficient No. Of COVID Infection Free Poll Workers Available: Calcutta HC To Election Commission On PIL To Postpone 4 Civic Polls

The Calcutta High Court today sought replies from the West Bengal State Election Commission and State Government on a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) plea filed seeking postponement of polls in 4 municipal corporations namely Siliguri, Chandernagore, Bidhannagar and Asansol.

The Bench of Chief Justice Prakash Shrivastava and Justice Rajarshi Bharadwaj has asked the election commission if a sufficient number of persons free from Covid infection are available for deployment on different booths for the purpose of holding elections.

The State Government has also been asked to place on record the facts and figures relating to the COVID situation including positivity rate, percentage of population affected with Covid, rate of increase of Covid affected persons, and containment zones in the four municipal corporations where elections are going to be held.

Essentially, the Court was dealing with a PIL filed by one Bimal Bhattacharya submitting that considering the present COVID situation it would not be in the larger interest to hold the elections of the four municipal corporations namely Siliguri, Chandernagore, Bidhannagar, and Asansol on 22nd January 2022.

It was also submitted that many of the areas of these municipal corporations have been declared as containment zone and even the revised guidelines issued by the Election Commission are not sufficient.

Lastly, it has been prayed in the PIL that considering the present Covid situation, the elections of these municipal corporations should be deferred initially at least for four weeks.

During the course of the hearing, the counsel for the Election Commission took the stand that the State has not declared any lockdown, therefore, there is no reason to defer the elections and the revised guideline takes care of the concern raised by the petitioner.

On the other hand, the counsel for the State has submitted that the issue mainly concerns the Election Commission. Seeking the replies of the State Election Commission and the State Government, the matter has been listed for further hearing on Thursday.

Case title - Bimal Bhattacharya vs. State of West Bengal & Ors.

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