Below is the result of the Bhatpara municipal corporation polls falling in the domain of influential Bharatiya Janata Party MP Arjun Singh. An analysis of the results received from Election Commission sources shows that there are five wards out of 35 where the vote share of West Bengal’s ruling Trinamool Congress has almost reached 95%. The BJP and Left have got at the most 12% of the votes in some wards. The TMC has got 79% of the votes overall in this municipality and the BJP has about 10%. The Left has netted around 9% of the votes.

This is not the case in only Bhatpara; there are some other municipalities too where the situation is similar. Following its landslide victory in the West Bengal assembly elections as well as wins in a string of bypolls last year, the TMC on Wednesday swept the state’s civic elections, bagging 102 of the 108 municipalities. It even secured the Kanthi municipality that falls in the area of leader of opposition and Nandigram’s BJP MLA Suvendu Adhikari. The BJP and Congress were unable to win a single civic body.

This is the data of the Bolpur constituency from EC sources. Here too, in five places the ruling party has got more than 90% of the votes. Even overall, in Bolpur, the TMC has secured over 90% of the votes. A lot of wards here went uncontested.

This type of voting pattern has been seen in various municipalities, and the opposition, which had been raising questions since the day of polls, has become more vociferous in its allegations of widespread rigging.

Political analyst Biswanath Chakraborty told News18, “This exceptional data clearly proves huge malpractice has taken place. In these civic polls, you will rarely get a booth where malpractice would not have been done by the ruling party cadre…Malpractice in Bengal has become the rule now. This is dangerous for the country.”

The opposition says the rigging theory was once put forward by the TMC when the Left was in power in Bengal. At the time, it was called “scientific rigging”. Now the same thing is being alleged by the TMC’s rivals.

BJP MP Arjun Singh told News18, “Everything has been done by the police. They have taken candidates to the thana. They have allowed rigging and everything. I am surprised at why it stopped at 90%. They should get more than 110% votes.”

The opposition is linking this with the 2018 panchayat polls when similar charges emerged. The same thing will happen in next year’s panchayat polls, the parties say.

The ruling Trinamool Congress, however, has a different take. Mahua Moitra, TMC MP and spokesperson, said, “If people voted for the TMC, what can be done? For example, in Krishnanagar in 2019 we were ahead in only one ward. In 2021 we were ahead in two wards. In these civic polls, we won all 16 wards. So if they vote for us, what can be done?”

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