Kolkata: BJP leader Dilip Ghosh has said that Assembly elections in West Bengal cannot be held without deployment of central forces, saying the atmosphere in the state is already tense and volatile due to the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise.
“The SIR was conducted in the state amid tensions and violence. Election is a difficult task and cannot be conducted without central forces. People are demanding central forces during the election,” he told ANI.
Ghosh argued that, given the clashes, objections and political friction linked to the SIR exercise, it would be impossible to conduct free and fair polls unless central forces are deployed at and around polling stations.
He also alleged that the state government is refusing to grant permission for the BJP’s “Parivartan Yatra” even though the party has court approval for it. “State government is not giving permission for the yatra, but we have the court’s permission and will go ahead with it. People want change in this upcoming election,” Ghosh said.
Earlier this week, chief minister Mamata Banerjee had warned that around 1.2 crore names could be removed or shifted to objection categories if all pending discrepancies in the SIR are acted upon. She described the exercise as a threat to democratic rights, stressing that the issue goes beyond party lines and religious identities.
To speed up the SIR, the Supreme Court has allowed the Calcutta High Court to deploy additional civil judges with at least three years of experience and, if needed, to seek help from the Chief Justices of Jharkhand and Odisha in verifying objections.
The High Court had noted that even 250 judicial officers would require about 80 days to clear over 50 lakh objections under the “Logical Discrepancy” category, highlighting the massive scale and time pressure behind the revision.
