Election body declared date for crucial Bhabinipur by poll
NEW DELHI : The Election Commission(ECI) on Saturday announced the by-poll in West Bengal’s Bhabinipur Assembly constituency.
The by-poll will be held on September 30. And, the counting of votes will be on October 3. It is a crucial election for Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in order to remain as CM of the state.
The poll body also announced bypoll dates for two other seats in Bengal (Samserganj) and (Jangipur), as well as Pipli in Odisha.
The seat has been vacant since May 21 after Banerjee’s TMC party leader MLA Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay resigned from the seat. In the 2021 Bengal assembly election , Banerjee lost the Nandigram seat from Suvendu Adhikari. She had contested from Bhabinipur seat in the previous two elections.
In 2011, when she became Bengal’s chief minister for the first time, she was a member of Parliament. At that time she did not contest the assembly elections. But, after a few months, she got elected from Bhabinipur. However, this time she decided to contest from Nandigram in East Midnapore against turncoat Adhikari. However, she was defeated by Adhikari by over 1,700 votes.
Though Banerjee was sworn in as the chief minister of West Bengal, as per the rule she will have to become an MLA within six months after the formation of the government. According to the Article 164 of the constitution a minister who is not an MLA within six months has to resign.
“A Minister who for any period of six consecutive months is not a member of the Legislature of the State shall at the expiration of that period cease to be a Minister.” The Election Commission also said that polls would be held in Samserganj and Jangipur of West Bengal and Pipli (Odisha) on September 30.
“… considering the constitutional exigency and special request from the state of West Bengal, it has (been) decided to hold bypoll for AC 159 – Bhabanipur. Much stricter norms have been kept by the Commission as an abundant caution to safeguard from COVID-19,” the top poll body said.
“After taking into consideration the inputs and views of Chief Secretaries of the concerned states, and the respective Chief Electoral Officers, the Commission has decided not to hold bypolls in other 31 Assembly constituencies and 3 Parliamentary constituencies,” it added. Covid cases in Bengal (and other poll-bound states) spiked during campaigning and voting earlier this year; in Bengal daily new cases reached a peak of over 20,000 in mid-May.
Ms Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress claimed an emphatic victory in the April-May election, winning 213 of a total of 294 seats in the Bengal Assembly, but she lost her individual contest. The Chief Minister had given up her stronghold of Bhabinipur to contest from Nandigram – a high-profile clash with the BJP’s Suvendu Adhikari, her former lieutenant.
(With Agency Inputs).
