Calcutta HC tells poll body to accept e-mail nominations

KOLKATA: The Calcutta high court on Tuesday directed the West Bengal State Election Commission (SEC) to accept nominations filed through e-mail by people who are eager to contest the coming panchayat elections but have not been able to submit papers.

The division bench of justice Biswanath Somadder and justice Arindam Mukherjee passed the order after hearing a petition filed by the CPI(M). The party appealed that nominations filed through e-mail should be officially accepted since its candidates were being threatened and prevented from contesting. The division bench directed the commission to accept nominations of candidates who sent it through e-mail or similar means to panchayat returning officers or the SEC before 3pm on April 23.

Lawyer and CPI(M) leader Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya said the judgment made it clear that all nominations filed through e- mail within the deadline fixed by the division bench should be accepted by the commission. On April 24, the single bench of justice Subrata Talukdar upheld nominations filed through Whatsapp by nine land agitators of Bhangar, who were allegedly prevented by ruling party supporters from reaching government offices for submission of nomination papers.

“Tuesday’s verdict is historic. Certificates of victory have already been issued to ruling party candidates who won without contest. It is time to see if SEC withdraws those certificates if it is found that nominations for those seats were filed through e-mail,” said CPI(M) central committee member Rabin Deb. “We will also appeal to the court to allow nominations mailed by BJP candidates to be accepted. There are around 2,000 applications from our candidates,” said party Bengal unit general secretary Pratap Banerjee.

In a parallel development, the SEC filed a report on security arrangements before the division bench of chief justice Jyotirmay Bhattacharya and justice Arijit Banerjee.