The Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress (TMC) on Friday moved the Supreme Court seeking inclusion of West Bengal government employees for appointment as supervisors of the West Bengal Assembly elections.
The Calcutta High Court on Thursday dismissed TMC’s plea challenging the Election Commission’s decision to deploy only central government and public sector (PSU) employees as supervisors during the counting of votes scheduled to take place on May 4.
As per the EC order issued through West Bengal’s Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), there must be at least one person at each counting table – specifically a counting supervisor – who is a central government official or PSU.
When the TMC challenged the order in the Calcutta High Court, the EC claimed that the directive was issued based on concerns about the neutrality of the counting process, and that similar directions had been implemented in other states, such as Kerala.
The bench of single judge Krishna Rao ruled that the selection of employees for these roles is “the prerogative of the EC office” and found no contravention of the law in the decision.
Now the battle has reached the Supreme Court, just days before the votes are scheduled to be counted.
