Same booths, opposite picture - Few voters, more police in Bidhannagar

Bidhannagar MLA Sujit Bose tells police to drive away journalists during the voting in
FD bloc of Salt Lake on October 3. Electoral malpractice was reported in this block,
the block is a picture of calm during repolling on Friday. Pictures by Sanjoy
Chattopadhyaya and Amit Datta

Tamaghna Banerjee, Snehal Sengupta and Abhijeet Chatterjee, TT, 

Repolling in nine booths of Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation and two in Asansol were a study in contrast to what played out on October 3.

The booths were crawling with policemen and the unfamiliar faces were missing, but so were voters. Metro presents the difference on the ground

Police

Oct. 9: Each booth had 50-odd policemen outside. Most of them carried guns and officers of the rank of inspectors were seen in charge of every booth. The policemen did not even allow residents who had cast their votes to stroll around the polling premises and chased away any suspicious presence. Around 8am, nine cars and two buses full of policemen were found posted outside the Administrative Training Institute in FD Block (the booth that had recorded close to 92 per cent of votes and where journalists were assaulted for photographing outsiders last Saturday). Today, only one voter was inside the booth when the policemen arrived. The booth finally recorded 8.88 per cent votes, the lowest among the nine.

In Asansol's booth No. 126 at Kalla Welfare Free Primary School in ward 14, at least 20 policemen, including four officers and eight lady constables, were deployed. Although voting was slow, no untoward incident was reported.

Oct. 3: Two constables stood guard outside each booth. One of them carried a gun, the other a lathi. They did not attempt to drive away outsiders who walked in and out of the booths freely all through the day or beat up journalists and Salt Lake residents. When the polling officers called the cops for help, they did not respond. Special teams of policemen who were on patrol also avoided the trouble-prone areas and left the place minutes after chasing mobs of unknown faces, allowing them to come back.

In the Asansol booth the previous voting day, a group of armed men had arrived in SUVs and opened fire at voters in front of three policemen armed with sticks. Two of the injured were BJP supporters.

Checks inside

Oct. 9: The voter I-card seemed to be a must. Many who had brought ID proof like driving licences or PAN cards were sent back and asked to bring the voter card. "I was carrying my driving licence, PAN card and office ID. But the poll officers refused to listen to me. I had to go back home and get the voter-I card," said Sandip Paul, a resident of AB block.

The polling officer at the booth said they had strict instruction from the state election commission to ask for only voter cards. "However, those who have genuine reasons for not having the voter- I card in possession were allowed to vote after thoroughly scanning other documents," the officer said.

Even journalists had to show their card and photo ID every time they entered a booth one at a time.

Oct. 3: No one checked the voter ID cards or any other photo identity credentials of voters. The CCTV at a booth at the AB community centre was broken while the cameras at several other booths were allegedly switched off when outsiders began rigging votes. While several polling agents worked under the instruction of the outsiders and the ruling party's polling agents, the presiding officer kept mum as was seen in a booth at FE block. Another presiding officer, in the FD community centre left the room.

Outside

Oct. 9: At the gates of the community centre, schools or other premises, where poll booths were set up, policemen looked for photo ID proof of every voter before letting them enter. A man accompanying Anindya Chatterjee, the ward 41 candidate, was not allowed to enter the premises after he was found belonging to another ward. The man was to supply food packets to the polling agents. When policemen did not allow him, Chatterjee himself distributed the food packets and water bottles to the agents.

Oct. 3: Anyone could enter the poll booth premises. Some outsiders and Trinamul supporters were seen camping inside the school on community hall premises as the police took no steps to drive them away. None of the photo identity cards were checked and anyone accompanying the candidate was given special treatment by allowing them to enter the booth before any voter.

Unknown faces

Oct. 9: There were none. This newspaper looked for them at every park, alley, crossroad and even some of the safe houses where they had put up since the election campaigns but they were nowhere.

"I had come to vote last Saturday but was intimidated seeing so many outsiders roaming around the booth. Someone told me the group had been attacking residents and reporters. We did not attempt to enter the booth and came back home. But we voted today without any interference," said Debopriya Paul, a post-graduate student in economics from Calcutta University and a resident of AB block.

Oct. 3: Across all the booths in Salt Lake, unfamiliar faces outnumbered real voters. They stood outside booths and crossroads intimidating the electorate, went in and out of the booths at ease, jammed booths for several minutes, beat up residents and journalists when faced with protests and rampaged in parts of the entire township by hurling bombs.