New Delhi, March 20 (IANS) The BJP and JD(U) leaders, on Friday came down heavily on West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for questioning the Election Commission’s neutrality in a social media post.

CM Banerjee had, on Thursday, accused the poll panel of “summarily and arbitrarily” removing “more than 50 senior officials” ahead of the end‑April Assembly poll.​

BJP leader Dilip Ghosh, told reporters, “She doesn’t have the right to give opinion or question anything. Everybody knows how she has run the government for the past 15 years and how she has behaved with officials here. Now she has nothing in her hands. So there is no point in writing letters.”

Placing his trust in the Election Commission, he said, “They have successfully conducted elections in Bihar. Here also there will be elections and there will be a change.”

Ghosh accused the Trinamool Congress of using a strategy to scare people using the police and goons, and distribute money among people in order to win the elections.

“This plan is not getting successful. Those police personnel who were loyal to the Trinamool have been jolted with the transfers, now the party is finding it difficult. They can’t do anything on their own,” he said.

JD(U) spokesperson Rajeev Ranjan Prasad, told IANS, “This is a routine process. The Election Commission does pass such order in states where polls are held. Now since Mamata Banerjee will not return to power due to her diminishing popularity among the masses, she is targeting the EC to divert the attention of the public.”

Defending the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, JD(U) leader Neeraj Kumar, said, “SIR has also happened in Bihar. Should a dead person’s name or someone who is not a citizen of the country remain in the voters’ list or should names of people be repeated in the list?”

He further told IANS, “Mamata Banerjee should answer whether her party has Booth Level Agents (BLAs) across polling booths. If they have, list of the BLAs’ names and mobile numbers should be made public.”

Meanwhile, Samajwadi Party MP, Rajeev Kumar Rai, defended CM Banerjee. He claimed that by using the Election Commission as a weapon, “unimaginable abductions are happening everywhere in democracy.”

Chief Minister Banerjee, on Thursday, wrote on her ‘X’ handle that the manner in which the Election Commission had singled out and targeted Bengal was unprecedented and deeply alarming. ​

She said that even before the formal notification of elections, more than 50 senior officials, including the Chief Secretary, Home Secretary, DGP, ADGs, IGs, DIGs, District Magistrates and Superintendents of Police, had been removed, calling it political interference rather than administrative action.​

She added that the systematic politicisation of institutions meant to remain impartial was a direct assault on the Indian Constitution. ​

She said that, at a time when a flawed SIR process was underway and over 200 lives had already been lost, the Commission’s conduct reflected bias and submission to political interests, putting the people of Bengal at risk.

–IANS

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