The opposition Congress Monday announced that it would contest all the seats of the by-elections of the three-tier panchayat, which fell vacant due to mass scale resignation of the office bearers after the BJP-Indigenous Peoples Front of Tripura came to power.
The state election commission has fixed by-elections to panchayat seats on coming September 30.
Polls would be held in 3207 seats in gram panchayats, 161 seats in panchayat samities and 18 seats in zila parishads.
President of the Tripura Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC), Birajit Sinha said, To maintain law and order in the state is the responsibility of the state government. If healthy democratic atmosphere does not prevail during the election, the Congress would not keep mum and appropriate actions would be initiated.
He said the process for selection of candidates for the by-elections in the block level has already started.
Besides, we have also declared the names of in-charges of Congress in all the blocks of the state. We have also geared up our party machinery for the September 30 by-elections, Sinha told reporters.
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Earlier on August 20 state party secretary of CPI (M) Bijan Dhar said, We are well aware that the state election department has taken initiative to hold the by-elections for the vacant posts in the three tier Panchayat bodies. We demand before conducting the by-polls the concerned authority must ensure proper democratic atmosphere in the state, so that opposition parties could participate in the elections without fear.
He also said due to political pressure of ruling BJP activists a huge number of people representatives had resigned after BJP-IPFT government was formed in Tripura in March last.
Abnormal vacancies were created due to resignations under duress, Dhar told reporters.
Ashoke Sinha, BJP spokesperson said, CPI-M allegation of forced resignation is baseless.
CPI-M lost organizational support after defeat in the state assembly elections that is why people had resigned. Nobody exercised any force on them. I am confident that our party would make good results in the by-elections, he said.
In a separate event, Sinha said, Congress would submit a memorandum to the Tripura Governor Kaptan Sing Solanki on September 20 alleging that Rafale aircraft deal was a scam of the ruling BJP.
On September 20 we would organize a huge rally from Congress Bhavan here, which would move in different parts of the Agartala town and submit a the memorandum to the governor as part of our nationwide protest. We named this campaign Bharat Bachao Rafael Ghotala, he said.
All India youth congress president Keshav Chand Jadav and Vice President Srinibah B.V will also join the rally.