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The Calcutta High Court has yet again left it up to the Commissioner of State Election Commission to decide on whether deployment of paramilitary forces is necessary in upcoming civic polls. The Commissioner is to hold a joint meeting with State authorities and decide on the same. 

Elections are to be held in 108 municipalities on 27th February. In lieu of the same the petitioners, including Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had asked for court's direction to deploy central forces along. The Court had passed a similar order with regards to election held for 4 municipalities on 12th February 2022. The SEC had decided not to deploy forces in the same. 

On Monday the Division Bench of Chief Justice Prakash Shrivastava and Justice Rajarshi Bharadwaj had heard elaborate arguments presented by Sr. Adv. Paramjit Patwalia on behalf of BJP alleging that large scale violence took place in the last phase of election and that the SEC did not measure the ground situation and decided not to deploy only on assurance of State.

"One of the major players (BJP) is feeling uncomfortable in the election. We are coming to court over and over again. Nowhere else we are bothering the courts like this," Patwalia said. 

The petitioner had also alleged irregularity in using paper seals on Electronic Voting Machines. The Court ordered such seals to be used for EVMs. 

The petitioner had also asked for independent observers from the center to oversee the election. The Court ordered appointment of impartial officers of IAS cadre to oversee the election. 

Patwalia had referred to certain schemes of the State Government namely, Duare Sarkar, Paraye Smadhan and Lakshmi'r Bhandar and stated that such scheme started after the declaration of election which is breach of the Model Code of Conduct. He further referred to a government scheme which allows distribution of title deeds of plots of lands to refugees of East Pakistan, who had been occupying such plots. Adv. Jayanta Mitra, SEC and AG S.N. Mukherjee had submitted that the schemes started before the announcement of election, they were only restarted after announcement. 

The Court order observed that restarting is not said to be continuing and order SEC not to permit such schemes until elections are over. 

With regards to the large scale violence alleged in the four municipalities, the Court asked for a separate application to be filed. 

Pratap Banerjee v. State of West Bengal & Ors.