State EC directs district election officers to ‘ensure proper utilisation’ of Central forces

MP | 24 June 2023 | Kolkata: The State Election Commission (SEC) on Saturday directed all district Panchayat election officers to ensure proper logistics and effective deployment of the Central forces that had started arriving in districts from Friday night. 

“The SEC asked us for proper utilisation of the Central forces so that their visibility is guaranteed before the common people. We have started route marches in various parts to build up the confidence among the voters as they go to polls on July 8. 

The state police are assisting them in identifying routes for their marches,” a senior administrative official from Birbhum district associated with the election process said. 

As per directions of the Commission, the Central forces are being sent first to those areas from where sporadic incidents of violence have been reported during filing and withdrawal of nominations. 

The exercise of area domination by the Central forces was witnessed at Bhangar in South 24-Parganas, Dinhata in Cooch Behar, Siuri in Birbhum to name a few. Some places in these areas had seen some disturbances in law and order situations during the nomination process. 

The Central forces also did route marches at Mall in Jalpaiguri, Arambagh in Hooghly and Jhargram among other areas. The Centre on Friday had cleared the immediate deployment of 315 companies of additional Central armed forces for the forthcoming polls. This is in addition to the 22 companies whose deployment had already been cleared. The SEC has sought 800 companies of additional forces from the Union Home Ministry. 

A total of 822 companies of Central forces may be deployed in the election process.
The 315 companies whose deployment has already started have a mix of personnel from the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) and Railway Protection Force (RPF). 

In the 2013 Panchayat polls in Bengal, where too Central armed forces were deployed following the insistence of the then state election commissioner, Meera Pandey, the election was held in five phases. In 2013, as many as 820 companies or 82,000 personnel of the Central armed forces were deployed. 

 https://www.millenniumpost.in/bengal/state-ec-directs-district-election-officers-to-ensure-proper-utilisation-of-central-forces-523276