Asansol: Clashes broke out on Monday morning in West Bengal’s Asansol as voting was held in the fourth round of the national election. The vehicle of BJP candidate and Union Minister Babul Supriyo was vandalised outside a polling station in Barabani when a fight erupted between workers of the BJP and the state’s ruling Trinamool Congress.
Visuals showed Babul Supriyo sitting in a car with the rear windows smashed. He said he would be on the road and visit every polling station where trouble was reported. “I will take central forces with me. People are saying give us central forces, let us vote,” he alleged.
The police used batons to control clashes that started at a polling booth after Trinamool workers insisted on continuing the voting process while BJP activists demanded that central forces come to the spot first.
Babul Supriyo tweeted details of polling booths where, according to him, there had been incidents of “violence and brutal intimidation” by members of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s party.
“Voters are not being allowed to vote,” alleged Babul Supriyo. “Our fight is to establish democracy. It is shameful that I am saying this in a democratic country,” he told reporters.
According to reports, the 48-year-old leader had a heated argument with polling officials inside a booth, following which Trinamool Congress supporters attacked his vehicle.
Babul Supriyo, who represents Asansol in parliament faces the Trinamool’s Moon Moon Sen in the constituency.
Babul Supriyo won an unlikely victory against the Left in his first election in 2014. Moon Moon Sen, who defeated nine-time lawmaker Basudeb Acharia of the Left in Bankura in 2014 to earn the name of “giant-killer”, has been moved to Asansol this time as the Trinamool tries to snatch the seat from the BJP.
The eight constituencies voting in Bengal on Monday are in the most violence-prone belt of the state, which is voting in all seven phases of the national election.
