The West Bengal state election commission moved the Supreme Court on Wednesday seeking direction that adequate security arrangements be made to prevent any law and order problem during the upcoming panchayat elections in the state.
The top court issued notices to the Centre and the West Bengal government seeking their response on how to meet the requirement of security personnel for conducting the panchayat elections scheduled for July 2. The election body told a vacation bench of justices A.K. Patnaik and Ranjan Gogoi that it was not possible to hold violence-free polls in the prevailing circumstances as enough security personnel were not available. Advocate Meenakshi Arora, appearing for the Election Commission, contended that the poll body was ready to hold the elections in more phases but security forces must be provided to it and even pleaded that the elections can be put off for some time. She contended that the Commission needed around 2,41,000 security personnel out of which 1,40,000 should be armed.
The state government submitted that it wanted the elections to be held at any cost and said that the matter is being heard by the Calcutta high court.
Advocates Amarendra Sharan and Somesh Jha, appearing for the state, accused the EC of not being interested in holding the polls and submitted that the Calcutta high court is hearing the case on a regular basis.