West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday alleged that the BJP was trying to include illegal voters from Bihar, Rajasthan, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh in the electoral rolls of the state to turn the poll outcome in favour of the saffron party.
Addressing an election rally in Paschim Medinipur's Chandrakona, Banerjee also reiterated her plea before the gathering to ignore who the TMC candidates in the state's assembly segments were and consider her as the candidate in all 294 seats.
"I was informed by Abhishek (Banerjee) yesterday that he had to rush to the EC office in Kolkata from the middle of his campaign schedule upon receiving information that about 30,000 forms were submitted in a single day to include fresh voters," the TMC supremo said.
"The BJP is trying to include illegal voters from Bihar, Rajasthan, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh in the electoral rolls of Bengal. They are planning to transport outstation voters by means of railways, as they did in Bihar, and get them to poll in seats of Asansol and Kharagpur," she alleged.
Banerjee's allegation came on a day the TMC supremo shot a strongly-worded letter to Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar stating that the Form 6 applications pertaining to "not genuine residents of Bengal having no legitimate connection to the state", is "illegal, unconstitutional and fundamentally undemocratic, reflecting mala fide intent and ill motive."
'SIR means devastation'
If the BJP tries to "squeeze in illegal voters from outside" in Bengal's electoral rolls, people will resist, Banerjee said at her second poll rally of the day in Garbeta.
"It will not get a single vote because the people of Bengal know that the saffron party has implemented this trick in states like Bihar and Maharashtra and got away with it because the opposition there failed to understand the ploy," she added.
Claiming that the BJP has "no respect" for Bengal and its people, the chief minister accused the party of colluding with the Election Commission and deleting names of women and minorities from the state's electoral rolls in the garb of the SIR exercise.
"It broke my heart to see the pictures of mothers and sisters belonging to Hindu, tribal, Muslim and scheduled caste communities, as well as elderly citizens, standing in queues once again to appeal before tribunals after their names were deleted from the SIR rolls. SIR means 'sarvanash' (devastation)," she said.
Banerjee claimed that it was her legal challenge before the Supreme Court that made the EC add 22 lakh names to the rolls.
On 18 lakhs deletions from supplementary lists, Banerjee alleged, "The BJP and the EC are snatching the citizenship, constitutional and democratic rights of people. We will fight them every inch of the way."
At the Garbeta rally, the CM claimed that the "BJP would have deleted 5 crore names" from Bengal's electoral rolls had her party not fought back.
"Forget who your TMC candidate is in your respective constituencies, consider me your candidate in all 294 seats of the state," she told the gathering.
"There will be no detention camps and no NRC in Bengal as long as we are in power," Banerjee added.
The TMC chief said that it was time to topple the BJP-led central government, which, she alleged, has politicised all statutory and constitutional bodies of the country, depriving citizens of their recourse to rights and justice.
"We will take Delhi after coming to power in Bengal. BJP has converted all constitutional bodies into their party offices. It's high time we take them back," she said.
Will probe allegation, says CEO
Meanwhile, West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer Manoj Kumar Agarwal on Tuesday promised to review the CCTV footage of his office after the Trinamool Congress alleged a BJP leader's representative brought a sackful of Form 6 there to enrol residents of other states as voters here.
Form 6 is filled for the inclusion of first-time voters in the electoral rolls or for shifting a voter from one constituency to another.
Addressing the allegations, Agarwal said the poll panel was taking the complaints seriously and would investigate the matter.
"I will see where the agency has installed CCTV... I will check what is in the footage and then consider the matter further," he told a local TV channel.
The CEO clarified that individuals already on the adjudication list cannot apply through Form 6, which is meant solely for the inclusion of new names.
All requests and complaints have been forwarded to Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) for verification, he said.
Agarwal also warned that those applying for inclusion of their names in the voters' list under false pretences would face legal consequences.
Notably, TMC leader Abhishek Banerjee has alleged the BJP had submitted around 30,000 Form 6 to the state chief electoral officer (CEO's) office within a few hours in clear violation of Supreme Court directives.
After meeting the CEO on Monday, Banerjee said, "We have credible information that about 30,000 Form 6s were submitted to the CEO's office in six to seven hours today, in clear violation of Supreme Court directives."
He had claimed the CEO could not provide satisfactory replies and that the TMC would "not take it lying down."