EC to take feedback from observers on violence during Amit Shah’s roadshow in Bengal

lok-sabha-elections

Updated: May 15, 2019 12:35 IST

The Election Commission will hold a meeting with West Bengal observers on poll violence in the state. The meeting will take place on Wednesday at 11:30 am via video conferencing, according to news agency ANI.

On Tuesday, a clash broke out between TMC and BJP workers at Amit Shah’s roadshow in Kolkata.

Mamata Banerjee-led TMC blamed the BJP’s supporters for the violence in College Street where a bust of iconic social reformer Iswarchandra Vidyasagar was vandalised in Vidyasagar College set up by him in 1872. The Bharatiya Janata Party alleged that stones were first thrown at them by TMC supporters during its president Amit Shah’s roadshow in the city.

“Trinamool Parliamentary team comprising @derekobrienmp, @Sukhendusekhar, Manish Gupta, Nadimul Haque seeks meeting with EC on May 15 in aftermath of attack on Bengal’s heritage after Shah roadshow in Kolkata. BJP outsider ruffians resort to arson & break Vidyasagar’s bust,” TMC said in a tweet on Tuesday.

A Bharatiya Janata Party delegation has already met the poll watchdog’s officials and complained about the violence in Kolkata. The BJP also demanded that the poll body bar chief minister Mamata Banerjee from campaigning for instigating her party workers for the violence. And, Amit Shah will hold a press conference in New Delhi on Wednesday.

Mamata Banerjee had condemned the attack and mentioned that an inquiry will be done.

Also read | ‘Murder of democracy’: BJP slams Mamata Banerjee over violence at Amit Shah roadshow

“It is a very unfortunate incident and an entire college was vandalised. A bust of Iswarchandra Vidyasagar was broken. I have kept broken parts of the bust where the original statue was there. I have never seen such political violence in Kolkata,” Banerjee said after visiting the college.

Amit Shah countered the incident with a tweet by asking people to vote against the Trinamool.

Also read | BJP, Trinamool spar over violence during Amit Shah’s Kolkata roadshow

“Writing on the wall is clear and Mamata didi has read it well. Didi, your violence and hooliganism can no more stop the people of Bengal from reclaiming the true legacy of this great land,” he tweeted.

Senior BJP leaders and chief minister of Maharashtra’s Devendra Fadnavis and Uttar Pradesh’s Yogi Adityanath also attacked the Trinamool Congress over the violence.

“Has Bengal acquired a Government of Gangsters? The attack on Amit Shah’s peaceful rally by the TMC is deplorable. “Is a free & fair Poll possible in Bengal? All eyes are now on the Election Commission,” finance minister Arun Jaitley tweeted.

The violence on Tuesday comes ahead of the seventh and final phase of the Lok Sabha election on May 19 in which nine parliamentary constituencies in West Bengal will poll.