The fate of several candidates from different political parties contesting the upcoming West Bengal assembly elections remains uncertain, with their names also “under adjudication”, even as more than six million voters remain in limbo with their claims pending before court-appointed judicial officers.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) published the first part of the final electoral roll for West Bengal on February 28, dropping 6.18 million names and retaining 70.46 million voters after the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) that lasted nearly four months.
The BJP has published the names of 255 candidates across two phases. The party has fielded Kalita Majhi from the Ausgram assembly constituency in East Burdwan; her name is “under adjudication”. She was the BJP’s candidate in the 2021 assembly polls and had lost to TMC’s Abhedananda Thander by around 11,800 votes.
“My name is under adjudication. I had submitted all documents. In my family, only my name is under adjudication. I have seven siblings. None of their names, including those of their family members, are in the adjudication list. I am not sure why my name was kept under adjudication,” said 38-year-old Majhi, a domestic maid by profession.
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The ruling TMC in West Bengal has already announced the names of 291 candidates out of the 294 assembly seats in the state, leaving three seats for the Bharatiya Gorkha Prajatantrik Morcha in the hills. Party leaders said that the names of many candidates, including sitting legislators and even ministers, have come under adjudication.
“I am a four-time MLA from Chanditala in Hooghly. I have been contesting assembly elections since 2006, even though I lost in the first election. But still my name was included in the adjudication list. The error was due to the change of my surname. My party higher-ups knew from the beginning that my name was under adjudication,” said Swati Khandoker, the TMC candidate from Chanditala in Hooghly and a sitting MLA.
Murshidabad and Malda, both bordering and Muslim-majority districts, have the highest number of cases under adjudication by judicial officers. While there are 11,01,145 such cases in Murshidabad, Malda, with 8,28,127 cases, comes second.
“I have two brothers and all three of our names are under adjudication. We have a bidi factory, a tea factory and a chemical factory. We run schools and nursing homes and do a lot of charity. But still my name was wrongly included in the adjudication list. I had informed Abhishek Banerjee and he had flagged my case in a recent public rally,” Bayron Biswas, the TMC’s candidate from the Sagardighi assembly seat in Murshidabad, told HT.
At least two other TMC candidates from the district, including Jakir Hossain, fielded from Jangipur, and Nur Alam, fielded from Samserganj, are also in the adjudication list. They did not respond to calls.
Unus Sarkar, the CPI(M)’s candidate from Jalangi in Murshidabad, was also in the adjudication list.
“I was a four-term legislator from 1991 to 2011. But still my name is under adjudication. The first supplementary list is expected to be published in a day or two. I expect that my name will get cleared. If not, we will take the legal course,” Sarkar told HT.
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Also “under adjudication” is the name of Md Ghulam Rabbani, state renewable energy minister and the TMC’s candidate from Goalpokhar in Uttar Dinajpur, which has a high Muslim population.
“I come from a political family. My father had contested the polls in 1995. I contested the elections in 2009, 2011, 2016 and 2021. But still my name is under adjudication. This is planned so that voters’ names are deleted from my constituency so that I may be defeated. I am grateful to Mamata Banerjee that she made me a candidate despite my name being under adjudication,” Rabbani said.
