Mamta Banerjee went on to Facebook to celebrate TMC victory, saying, “It’s TMC all the way in rural Bengal”, she thanked all her supporters and expressed love to the people of Bengal. According to the state’s chief minister, Banerjee, this election has demonstrated that only the TMC has the support of the state’s citizens.
A total of 232 panchayat samitis, 2552 out of 3,317-gram panchayats, and 12 out of 20 zilla parishads were won by the TMC.
In all three tiers of the West Bengal panchayat local government, the Trinamool Congress (TMC) won a majority of the votes. 2,552 of the 3,317-gram panchayats, 232 of the panchayat samiti, and 12 of the 20 zilla parishads were undefeated in the TMC. Only 212-gram panchayats, seven panchayat samitis, and no zilla parishads were won by the BJP, which came in a distant second.
Results from some areas are still awaited.
Yesterday morning, the panchayat elections vote-counting process got underway. 63,229-gram panchayat seats, 9,730 panchayat samiti seats, and 928 zilla parishad seats are among the more than 74,000 seats that are up for grabs.
The outcomes and patterns demonstrate how the panchayat elections differed from the 2021 assembly elections. Bengal’s rural people may have slowly begun to reject the Trinamool-BJP bipolar narrative by supporting Congress and CPM candidates in several locations, particularly in the south and middle of the country.
Overall, it appears that the rural polling patterns have followed the script of the 2022 urban civic elections: TMC decimates the opposition throughout Bengal, except for a few pockets of glum resistance, mostly in middle Bengal.
In the 2018 rural elections, TMC won by a landslide in 34.8% of the seats. It received 56% of the vote, but just a year later, in the Lok Sabha elections, that number dropped to 43.3%. 9.8% of the panchayat seats were won by the party this time around without any opposition. Before the Lok Sabha election next year, it will have a better understanding of how popular it is after being compelled to compete for more than 90% of rural Bengal.
Anit Thapa’s Bharatiya Gorkha Prajatantrik Morcha, a Trinamool ally, is in the lead in the hills, which differs from the outcomes of the 2019 Lok Sabha and the 2021 assembly elections. The BJP’s stronghold of Alipurduar was broken by Trinamool, and current polling data indicates that Mamata’s party is set to win the majority of gram panchayat and panchayat samiti seats there.
Repeated Violence again during Bengal Elections
Violence was rife during the elections on Saturday, which were billed as a popularity test for Trinamool leader and West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Violence once more disrupted the Monday re-voting at several booths. Since Saturday, about 40 people have died as a result of violence related to the election. In response to charges of election fraud, booth capture, and numerous reports of electoral irregularities and voter suppression throughout the voting, revoting was conducted in 696 booths.
Last night, there was an outbreak of violence in Bhangar, South 24 Parganas, with reports of gunfire. There is a possibility of one death, and a police officer has also been hurt.
Yesterday morning, explosives went off close to a counting centre in Murshidabad, while the police in Howrah had to use batons to break up a gathering.
The Trinamool has been accused by the opposition BJP of making frantic attempts to steal votes by denying opposition observers access to the voting booths.
By preventing candidates from the BJP and other opposition political parties from entering the counting centres, TMC goons are attempting in vain to steal the elections. Suvendu Adhikari, the leader of the opposition, was quoted by the news agency PTI as saying that they were being prevented from approaching the location and that bombs were being thrown to frighten away counting agents.
According to claims made by the Trinamool, 60% of those slain in election-related violence were either their sympathizers or employees.
Voters wouldn’t be swayed by a vicious campaign using false propaganda to disparage the AITC State Govt in WB! Abhishek Banerjee, the head of the Trinamool party, responded to the accusations of election fraud.
The Union Home Minister Amit Shah requested a report from West Bengal Governor CV Ananda Bose due to the widespread violence and claims of ballot box tampering. Mr. Bose also threatened to take harsh action against the perpetrators of the assault.
