Kolkata: A Calcutta High Court judge, hearing former West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s plea against the poll result in the Bhabanipur Assembly seat, informed her lawyer Kalyan Banerjee that his elder brother is a BJP spokesperson and he will hear the matter after full disclosure so that there are no issues later on.
While taking up the Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief’s election petition, Justice Gaurang Kant told Kalyan Banerjee, himself a TMC Lok Sabha MP, that he wanted to “make it very clear that my elder brother is a national spokesperson for Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).”
Justice Kant stated that this might be of some concern as far as the petition is concerned, adding that he will hear the election petition “after full disclosure so that you don’t have any issues later on”, as reported by PTI.
Senior advocate Kalyan Banerjee told the court that he has all “confidence and regard” for the judge.
Stating that he knows his judge, the lawyer said that he has appeared before this court earlier and added, “My confidence and respect to you as a judge is not determined by any other factor.”
“I have confidence in the judiciary, and I believe Indian Judiciary can be independent only when a judge is independent,” Mamata’s counsel said.
Justice Kant is one of the gentleman and erudite judges of the high court and he feels that no one is a factor to him, whether a relative or not, Kalyan said.
“We are here to dispense justice, (It) doesn’t matter to us,” Justice Kant then said.
On Kalyan’s prayer, the High Court directed the Election Commission to preserve and keep in safe custody the CCTV footage of the counting centre at Sakhawat Memorial School at Bhabanipur where the counting of votes for the elections were held on May 4.
Footage from both inside and outside the counting hall will have to be preserved.
Justice Kant also ordered preserving the EVMs, including control units and ballot units used in all polling booths of Bhabanipur and all VVPAT machines used in the constituency.
The CCTV footage, EVMs and VVPATs will not be erased, overwritten, destroyed, tampered with, transferred, redeployed, opened or dealt with in any manner without the permission of this court, the judge further directed.
The Court directed the counsel for the respondents in the petition to file their affidavits in opposition by four weeks and an affidavit in reply by the petitioner within four weeks thereafter. The matter will come up for hearing again after 12 weeks.
The election petition was filed by Mamata on allegations of corrupt practices, illegal deletion of voters from the electoral rolls, irregularities in counting and non-compliance with the provisions of the Constitution and the Representation of the People’s Act.
It was alleged that a substantial number of voters were unlawfully deleted from the electoral rolls during the SIR process, and the returning officer for the constituency was appointed despite an alleged conflict of interest.
Kalyan also alleged that serious irregularities occurred during the counting process on May 4, resulting in the exclusion of the petitioner’s counting agents from the counting hall and causing subsequent prejudice to the petitioner.
It was claimed that the election result was affected by the alleged irregularities. Mamata lost the seat to present West Bengal chief minister Suvendu Adhikari.
Kalyan submitted that irregularities occurred after the 12th round of counting. From an 18 per cent lead in Mamata’s favour, it went to an 81 per cent lead in favour of Adhikari, he said and maintained that CCTV footage will show the occurrences inside the counting hall.
Alleging a “quid pro quo” arrangement, Kalyan stated that the returning officer for the Bhabanipur seat held the same position in the 2021 Nandigram election, where Adhikari and trounced Mamata.
He went on to allege that the officer was made joint secretary in the CMO immediately after Adhikari took oath as the chief minister of West Bengal.
