Kolkata: As the Trinamool Congress secured a massive victory in the panchayat elections in West Bengal, a war of words broke out between the ruling party and the opposition BJP on Thursday over the violence that rocked parts of the state.
The TMC won all 20 Zila Parishads in the three-tier panchayat system, bagging a straight 880 seats, while its nearest rival BJP won 31 seats of the total 928. The Congress-Left Front alliance secured 15 seats while others won the remaining two seats.
The TMC won over 35,000 gram panchayat seats of the total 63,219. The BJP won nearly 10,000 seats, while the Left-Congress bagged about 6,000 seats.
Though the counting of votes began on Tuesday, the final tally of seats is yet to be released by the State Election Commission (SEC), which is still compiling data from the districts as the polling was held through ballot papers, an official said.
“The results have to be certified by the district officials, so it is taking some time. The final tally will hopefully be out in the evening,” the SEC official said.
Sharing a few video clips on Twitter, leader of opposition Suvendu Adhikari of the BJP alleged that the counting process was rigged.
He claimed that people resisted the violence on polling day and went to the booths to cast their votes, but they could not do the same at the counting centres where the administration perpetrated a “loot”.
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“At the counting centres, the whole system worked to corner and create pressure on the opposition,” he alleged.
Hitting back, TMC state general secretary Kunal Ghosh said that Adhikari was “preaching” about free and fair elections when under his watch, the BJP “unleashed absolute havoc” in his home district Purba Medinipur during the election.
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