Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) General Secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya on Wednesday lauded the Election Commission's decision to cut short the poll campaigning in West Bengal. He further urged the electoral body to round up all "anti-social elements working under the state government".
"The Election Commission has taken this matter seriously. I want to thank EC for this, but I would also like to say if EC will round up the anti-social elements working under the state government, then the elections can take place peacefully across the state. It is very important to do this because these anti-social elements go to villages and scare the people there and take away their voter IDs," Vijayvargiya told ANI here.
The Election Commission earlier today cut short the campaign period in West Bengal by a day for the final phase of Lok Sabha elections in view of the violence during BJP president Amit Shah's roadshow on Tuesday.
"No election campaigning to be held in nine parliamentary constituencies of West Bengal, namely Dum Dum, Barasat, Basirhat, Jaynagar, Mathurapur, Jadavpur, Diamond Harbour, South and North Kolkata, from 10 pm tomorrow till the conclusion of polls," Deputy Election Commissioner Chandra Bhushan Kumar told media.
Campaigning was originally scheduled to end at 5 pm on Friday for the nine constituencies that will go to polls on May 19. The Commission also directed that the controversial police official Rajiv Kumar, ADG CID, be relieved from his post and attached him to the Ministry of Home Affairs.
Talking about Rajeev Kumar, Vijayvargiya said, "Rajeev Kumar is amongst those officers in the state, who can do anything for the people sitting in power by going out of the way. He had even misguided CBI in the chit fund case... Mamata ji can say anything what she wants. Our 102 workers died in last three years, have we even slapped a TMC worker?"
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Tensions mounted yesterday after violence erupted during Shah's roadshow when the statue of iconic social reformer Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar was vandalised in a college named after him.
The decision was taken by the EC after the three-member commission held a meeting via video conference with the Chief Electoral Officer of West Bengal and other officials in the wake of Tuesday's incidents over which BJP and the Trinamool Congress traded mutual allegations of being responsible for it.
The official said this is probably the first time the EC has invoked Article 324 in this manner, adding that it may not be last in cases of repetition of lawlessness and violence which vitiate the conduct of polls in a peaceful manner.