Kolkata
Tapan already wooing Dum Dum voters
Former Union Minister of state for telecommunications Tapan Sikder who returned to BJP on Friday said that he had already launched his election campaign for Dum Dum Lok Sabha seat. Sikder, who had left BJP in 2005 to join Uma Bharti’s party, was elected from Dum Dum twice — in 1998 and in 1999. A confident Sikder said that he was hopeful of getting support of all political parties, including Trinamool Congress. “I am telling people, especially those from the Trinamool Congress, that for the three terms we had alliances. But now the Congress and the Trinamool are going to have an alliance there. However, I will exhort people to vote for the person who worked for them,” Sikder told The Indian Express. The former BJP state unit president has also started consolidating his position in the party, a section of which is still opposed to his re-entry. “The whole party seems to have been rejuvenated because of the come-back of a dynamic leader like Sikder, during whose leadership the party won two Lok Sabha seats and one Assembly seat,” a senior leader of the state BJP unit said.
Photo I-card campaign till March 10
To help more voters get Electoral Photo Identity Card (EPIC) in the state, the Election Commission (EC) has decided to organise photography campaign in various parts of the state till March 10. As per the official records, the state has around 5.23 crore voters. Moreover, in order to reduce rigging and impersonation in the voters’ list, the EC has formed standing committees in all the 294 Assembly constituencies in the state. The committee consists of an Electoral Registration Officer (ERO). Chief Electoral Officer Debashis Sen said that the step has been taken after acquiring the consensus of all political parties. According to Sen, the committees have been formed to set up a transparent mechanism that will ensure error-free electoral rolls in all the constituencies.
