On June 15, the Calcutta High Court directed the West Bengal State Election Commission to requisition the deployment of central forces for all districts within 48 hours of receipt of the court’s order for the panchayat elections. The court has further held that the Government of India will bear the cost for deployment and not the West Bengal government. The court was hearing the BJP Leader of Opposition in the West Bengal Legislative Assembly Suvendu Adhikari’s writ petition.
The court noted that a direction was passed on June 13, 2023, wherein the court directed the State Election Commission to review the state government’s assessment plan and requisition deployment of central forces in areas where there is an inadequacy of the state police.
The court referred to the past incidents of violence in the State of West Bengal and said, “Considering the fact that the total number of seats for which the election has to be conducted is more than 75000 and going by the past incidents wherein on more than 12 occasion the court had to intervene for directing deployment of central forces or transferring the cases to the National Investigating Agency, we are of the view that the State Election Commission should and shall requisition the deployment of central forces to work in tandem with the police force of the State of West Bengal to ensure free and fair elections.”
The court said, “This requisition shall be done forthwith by the State Election Commission and on receipt of the same, the appropriate authority of the central government shall deploy the required strength without loss of time.”
The court, in its June 15 verdict, noted that the State Election Commission had not requisitioned the deployment of central forces till the writ petition was filed and heard in the moving session. The court said that the State Election Commission’s actions should be considered to be a “deliberate violence of the order and direction” issued in the earlier writ petitions.
Furthermore, the petitioner Suvendu Adhikari referred to the report of the Enquiry Committee constituted by the National Human Rights Commission dated July 12, 2021. The report concerns the post-poll violence in the State of West Bengal after the Assembly Elections. The court noted, “The report is a very voluminous report which states that the situation in the State of West Bengal is manifestation of “Law of Ruler” instead of “Rule of Law”.”
The petitioner submitted that the little efforts of the State machinery to prevent, control or rectify the violent incidents indicates a larger picture of organised violence by supporters of the ruling party in retribution against the persons who desire to support the other party. Furthermore, the petitioner submitted that while some organs of the State government remained mute spectators, others were complicit.
The court noted, “Further, the report states that most of the violent incidents included murder, rape, molestation, assault, vandalism, looting, dispensation, arson and extortion, threat and intimidation and pertinently they were neither sporadic nor random instead they targeted specific person and that there are large gaps in the cases registered by the police as compared to the compliant received by the Committee of the NHRC.”
The court further notes, “Further, the report states that the poor and common people have lost faith in police. Further, it is stated in the report that the spread of violence shows pernicious politico-bureaucratic-criminal nexus.”
The petitioner further places reliance on an NGO’s fact-finding committee report on the post-poll violence in the State of West Bengal, wherein it is stated, “more than 25 persons including women were murdered, over 15000 incidents of violence took place, 7000 women were molested, 16 districts out of 26 districts of the State were badly affected due to violence.” However, the West Bengal government’s counsel said that the report cannot be relied upon and admitted as evidence.
The court noted that in the order dated June 13, 2023, the court said that the requisition of central forces would aid and assist in the conduct of free and fair elections. The court had also noted that there was an inadequacy in the police force. The court, taking note of the June 13 order, said, “In our view, it is not clear as to why the State Election Commission and the State of West Bengal are averse to deployment of Central Forces when on earlier occasion such deployment has yielded the necessary result.”
The court further said, “Thus, even assuming the police forces have been requisitioned from the neighbouring States, in our opinion, the same will not solve the issue and the assistance of the Central Forces is vitally required as the methodology that will be adopted by such Central Forces are quite distinct and such presence and assistance of the Central Forces have yielded results earlier.”
The court said, “Therefore, this Court is at a loss to understand as to why the State Election Commission is yet to identify the sensitive districts in spite of several news reports reporting violence in several areas whereby the candidates who were desirous of filing nominations were prevented from doing so.”
The court held that the State Election Commission had not taken appreciable steps as per the court’s orders in earlier writ petitions and no effective steps had been taken to identify the sensitive areas from the law and order point of view. The court said, “we are of the view that waiting any longer will cause more damage to the situation and will not aid in protecting the purity of the election process.” Thus, the court directed the State Election Commission to requisition central forces within 48 hours of the court’s verdict for all districts of West Bengal.
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