A delegation of Trinamool Congress MPs will meet Election Commission officials in Delhi today. The delegation will include parliamentarians Derek O'Brien, Kalyan Banerjee, Pratima Mondal and Santanu Sen. They are scheduled to reach the Election Commission of India (ECI) office at 3.30pm.
The meeting will happen days after the poll body barred TMC supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee from campaigning for 24 hours. She had on Tuesday sat on a 3.5-hour-long dharna against the poll panel's decision. On Monday, her party alleged the poll panel was behaving like a "wing of the BJP" and its decision smacks of authoritarianism. The TMC had also asked the EC to "at least maintain an impartial face".
It was not just the TMC. CPI(M)'s West Bengal secretary Surya Kanta Mishra questioned the commission's impartiality. Mishra alleged at a press conference that despite the Sanjukta Morcha of the Left parties, Congress and the Indian Secular Front (ISF) lodging several complaints of electoral malpractices with the EC, none of them was addressed as the poll panel is only interested in "pleasing the TMC and the BJP".
The Election Commission had earlier issued a notice to Banerjee for her alleged appeal to Muslim voters while campaigning in Hooghly to not allow their votes get split among different political parties. Apart from Banerjee, the Election Commission had also issued a notice to Suvendu Adhikari, the BJP candidate from Nandigram in West Bengal, for alleged communal overtones.
-Inputs from PTI
