BJP wins 83% of 6,646 seats unopposed in gram panchayat polls in Tripura

Ahead of the panchayat elections in Tripura, the ruling BJP has won over 5,500 (83 per cent) of the 6,646 seats unopposed in the three-tier rural body polls, officials said on Friday. The State Election Commission (SEC) said that as majority of the candidates of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have been elected unopposed, elections are now likely to be held for around 850 gram panchayat, 85 panchayat samiti and 80 zilla parishad seats on July 27.

"Several opposition parties including CPI-M (Communist Party of India-Marxist) and Congress, did not field candidates in majority of the seats and the two parties have also withdrawn many candidatures," an official of SEC said.

Panchayat elections were scheduled to be held on July 27 in 6,646 seats of 591 gram panchayats (6,111 seats), 35 panchayat samitis (419 seats) and eight zilla parishads (116 seats). 

The last date for withdrawal of candidatures was on Thursday. Counting of votes will take place on July 31. The electioneering for the local bodies had witnessed political violence and clashes during the past two weeks injuring at least 75 political leaders and workers of the ruling BJP, CPI-M and Congress.

According to the police, the pre-poll violence and clashes mainly took place in South Tripura, West Tripura, Khowai and North Tripura districts.

Leaders of the CPI-M-led Left Front and the Congress separately alleged that due to "large scale intimidation by BJP workers, there is no conducive situation to hold the panchayat polls" and so their candidates have failed to submit nominations in thousands of seats.

Rubbishing the accusations, BJP leaders claimed that the opposition parties have lost their political bases and were not getting anyone to be fielded as their candidates.

"Both the CPI-M and the Congress are not ready to fight the panchayat elections fearing their inevitable defeat. That is why they are making unfounded and fake allegations against the BJP," party spokesman Nabendu Bhattacharjee said.