Kolkata, March 10 A division bench of the Calcutta High Court will this week hear a crucial public interest litigation (PIL) on the risk of foreign nationals participating as candidates in the polls in West Bengal.
It is learnt that the division bench of Calcutta High Court’s Chief Justice T.S. Sivagnanam and Justice Chaitali Chattopadhyay will hear the PIL filed by an individual, Manik Fakir, in which the External Affairs Ministry, Election Commission of India (ECI), and the West Bengal Election Commission have been made parties.
High Court insiders said that the matter is expected to come up for hearing at the division bench headed by the Chief Justice on March 13.
It is reported that in his PIL, the petitioner pointed out that there have been past instances of controversies arising over foreign nationals contesting both state Assembly elections conducted by the ECI and the Panchayat and rural civic body polls conducted by the State Election Commission.
That is why the petitioner has made both the ECI and the West Bengal Election Commission parties in the public interest litigation. And since the issue involved foreign nationals, the External Affairs Ministry has also been a party in the case.
In the PIL, the petitioner has argued that since West Bengal will be heading for the crucial Assembly polls next year, the administrative bodies responsible for the smooth conducting of the polls should also ensure that not a single foreign national can contest by using forged identity documents establishing his or her Indian citizenship.
As an example, the petitioner highlighted the case of Trinamool Congress Panchayat Chief Lovely Khatun, who got elected and also became the chief of a village panchayat under the Harishchandrapur block in the Malda district of West Bengal in the 2023 polls for the three-tier panchayat polls in West Bengal.
Later, it was revealed that her actual name is Nasia Sheikh, a resident of neighboring Bangladesh, who entered India in 2015 and subsequently arranged fake Indian identity documents for herself.
The petitioner has also cited an example where questions were raised about the Trinamool Congress candidate from the Bangaon (Dakshin) Assembly constituency in the North 24 Parganas district in the 2021 state Assembly polls, Alo Rani Sarkar.
Although she was defeated by BJP’s Swapan Majumdar, an election petition was filed at the Calcutta High Court challenging her Indian identity. Later, it was revealed that her name was enlisted in the voters’ list in Bangladesh.
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