Kolkata, April 8 (IANS) Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), Gyanesh Kumar, on Wednesday ordered the immediate removal of an Election Commission of India (ECI)-appointed polls observer for the forthcoming two-phase Assembly election in West Bengal later this month, as the observer concerned did not have the practical knowledge about the polling booth network in the area for which he was appointed by the Commission.

The lack of knowledge of the poll observer, Anurag Yadav, the general observer for Cooch Behar (Dakshin) Assembly constituency in Cooch Behar district, was revealed at a virtual meeting chaired by the CEC and attended by the general observers.

Insiders aware of the development at the meeting said that CEC Kumar expressed anger over the fact that the ECI-appointed general observer for the Cooch Behar (Dakshin) Assembly constituency did not have the basic knowledge of the number of booths in the constituency.

The CEC also reportedly raised questions about the sense of responsibility of Yadav and immediately ordered his relief from the general observer duty.

CEC Kumar, sources aware of the development said, also observed that despite being appointed as the general observer for Cooch Behar (Dakshin) for quite some time, Yadav did not do the basic homework to carry out his duty efficiently, and in such a situation, it was doubtful how effective he would be for that position.

This time, the ECI had appointed one general observer for each of the 294 Assembly constituencies in West Bengal.

West Bengal is the only poll-bound state where the Commission had decided to appoint one observer for each Assembly constituency.

West Bengal also has the maximum number of police observers at 84, followed by 40 in Tamil Nadu, 35 in Assam, 17 in Kerala, and four in Puducherry.

In the case of the expenditure observers, Tamil Nadu has the maximum deployment at 151, followed by West Bengal at 100.

–IANS

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