QKolkata: Don’t Play Politics Over Martyrs Says Mamata & More

Your daily lowdown of all things Kolkata.

Mamata Banerjee addressing the press conference. 

(Photo: ANI screengrab)

1. Polls Are Not Won Playing Politics Over Martyrs: Didi

Chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday launched her sharpest attack on the Narendra Modi government, accusing it of playing politics over jawans’ blood with a caution that elections are not won playing politics over martyrs.

“You cannot win elections over jawans’ blood. A jawan sheds his blood for the country. They serve the country. They do not indulge in politics,” she told reporters at Nabanna. “I strongly condemn those who play politics with martyrs. We are with the armed forces. We are with the martyrs,” she said.

(Source: The Times Of India)

2. Bengal Congress Push For Tie-Up With The Left Front

The Bengal unit of the Congress has asked party president Rahul Gandhi to consider the “need” to share seats with the CPM for general election so that the BJP’s progress can be checked in the state and Trinamul Congress can be ousted from power in the 2021 Assembly polls.

Sources at Bengal Congress headquarters Bidhan Bhavan here said state party chief Somen Mitra had written to Rahul to impress upon him the need to enter into an electoral understanding with the Left Front.

(Source: The Telegraph)

3. EC Asks Bengal To Furnish Force Details

With more than 18,000 hamlets (a term used by the Election Commission to determine sensitive pockets) identified as vulnerable by the poll panel, it has now sought a detailed report of forces — both armed and unarmed — from the Bengal government within a week.

The commission also sought details of how Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) personnel were deployed in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections and 2016 assembly polls. EC officials said the details are necessary to prepare a detailed deployment pattern and full-proof security design.

(Source: The Times Of India)

4. Safeguards For Votes Of Disabled

The Election Commission has directed district magistrates to create a database of physically challenged voters and specify the nature of disability in electoral rolls to prevent workers of political parties from influencing such individuals or casting their ballots in the guise of “assisting” them.

Sources said such rolls would be given only to the presiding officers, not the voters or parties. The order comes as officials finalise preparations for the Lok Sabha elections, expected to be announced this month.

An official said there were around three lakh physically challenged voters in Bengal, including those with visual problems. The highest is in Murshidabad (over 30,000) and Birbhum (over 23,000), the official added.

(Source: The Telegraph)

5. Arrest Relief For Mukul Roy Extended

The high court on Tuesday extended by eight weeks the time limit of its interim order that had restrained police from arresting BJP leader Mukul Roy in connection with the murder of Trinamul Krishnaganj MLA Satyajit Biswas.

As per Tuesday’s interim order issued by the division bench headed by Justice Jaymalya Bagchi, Roy cannot be arrested and he cannot enter Nadia district till 24 April, the date fixed for hearing the matter again.

Biswas had been murdered on 9 February. After the murder, an FIR was lodged with police, naming Roy and four others. Roy was charged with criminal conspiracy.

Apprehending arrest, Roy had moved an anticipatory bail plea before the high court on 13 February.

(Source: The Telegraph)

6. Cable Wire Mess Clean-Up Starts From Mayor’s Backyard

Local cable operators (LCOs) in Chetla have begun cleaning up and streamlining the dangling mess of wires in the neighbourhood by removing redundant optic fibre cables that form a bulk of the mesh strung on streetlight poles.

“We are identifying live cables and segregating them. Thereafter, the dead cable lines will be removed. The live lines will then be strung together by aluminium wire and dressed so that the bunch takes the shape of a thick cable bun instead of many loose cables,” said Shantanu Bose, a cable operator in Chetla.

(Source: The Times Of India)

7. Jadavpur Hawkers Take A Cue From Hatibagan, Replace Plastic With Tin

Days after hawkers settled in pavements around north Kolkata’s Hatigaban dismantled their bamboo frame stalls draped with tarpaulin and plastic sheet and erected sturdy steel structures with corrugated tin sheds in place, hawkers in south Kolkata’s Jadavpur have followed suit, replacing the flimsy structure with pre-fabricated steel structures and tin sheets.

Local residents in Jadavpur woke up on Tuesday morning to discover the overnight transformation that had taken place near the 8B bus bus stand. They claimed their action was in line with mayor Firhad Hakim’s plea that plastic sheets be removed from hawking hubs. Accordingly, the Trinamool Congress-run hawkers’ union had asked over 100 hawkers in the vicinity of Jadavpur University to remove the plastic sheets from their stalls.

(Source: The Times Of India)