EC team holds meeting with NGO leaders in Aizawl

| | New Delhi
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EC team holds meeting with NGO leaders in Aizawl

Saturday, 10 November 2018 | PNS | New Delhi

A high-level Election Commission team on Friday held a series of meetings, including with the Mizoram NGO Coordination Committee (MNCC), which has been spearheading a State-wide protest calling for removal of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO)S B Shashank and reinstatement of the ousted Principal Secretary (Home) Lalnunmawia Chuaungo.

“The EC team headed by Deputy Election Commissioner Sudeep Jain, immediately after their arrival in Aizawl on Friday afternoon, started holding meetings with various groups and Church leaders. The EC officials first held meetings with the leaders of MNCC and also with the State Government and election department officials,” an official EC said. The other members of the EC team include Jharkhand CEO Lalbiakthanga Khiangte, EC Secretary SB Joshi and Mizoram's Additional CEO Lalzarmawii. The outcomes of the meetings were not yet known. Also, it was not clear how the ongoing standoff would be resolved.

The official said that the EC team, comprising four officials, was likely visit one or two district headquarters on Saturday to study the preparedness of the November 28 polls to the 40-member Mizoram assembly. The current visit by the poll panel team led by Jain follows a similar exercise by a three-member team of the Election Commission on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Shashank had allegedly sought deployment of additional central armed police forces (CAPF) in the state and complained to the EC that the state's former principal secretary Lalnunmawia Chuaungo was interfering with the poll process. Chuaungo, a native of Mizoram and a Gujarat-cadre IAS officer was relieved of his duties earlier this month. The committee, along with other political leaders, had been demanding Shashank's exit from the State since then.

The leaders of MNCC, led by Mizoram's most powerful NGO, Young Mizo Association, started the agitation on Tuesday demanding removal of CEO S.B. Shashank after Principal Secretary (Home) Lalnunmawia Chuaungo was removed on an Election Commission order.

The MNCC is also demanding that 11,232 voters among the tribal refugees lodged in seven Tripura relief camps be allowed to exercise their franchise at their respective polling stations in Mizoram and not in Tripura, as committed by the poll panel in 2014.

The MNCC's agitation was supported by Chief Minister Lal Thanhawla and his ruling party Congress and opposition parties including Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Thousands of people from the Bru community had fled Mizoram in 1997 following ethnic clashes. They have since been lodged in six relief camps in Tripura.  Friday is the last day for filing poll nominations, the list of which is expected to be released by 5pm. Election to the 40-member Mizoram Assembly will be held on November 28.

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