Bengal polls: Calcutta HC stays EC order to take preventive action against ‘troublemakers’

The Calcutta High Court on Wednesday stayed an order issued by Election Commission officials to the police in West Bengal to take preventive action against “troublemakers” ahead of the upcoming Assembly elections in the state, Bar and Bench reported.

The police observer in the office of the chief election officer had “erred in issuing a blanket direction by treating certain citizens as troublemakers”, the Hindustan Times quoted a bench of Chief justice Sujoy Paul and Justice Partha Sarathi Sen as saying.

The judges stayed the order till June 30.

The matter pertained to an alleged order, titled “Preventive action against persons involved in voter intimidation”, issued by the police observer in the CEO office to the state director general of police on April 21, the newspaper reported.

The order allegedly had a list of “troublemakers”, and had claimed that they were involved in intimidating voters and disturbing the electoral process.

Subsequently, a public interest litigation was filed in the court by an advocate named Mohammed Danish Farooqui, who claimed that he had found out about the list of “troublemakers” from “multiple credible, trustworthy and independent sources”.

The petition claimed the purported list of about 800 persons largely contained the names of workers, office-bearers and elected officials from the ruling Trinamool Congress in the state.

It alleged that the move was aimed at targeting the...

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