Carrying eleven non-bailable charges on his head, Nishit Pramanik, the BJP candidate for the Coochbehar Lok Sabha seat, seems to have become a headache for the saffron party.
Trinamool Congress has already approached the Election Commission of India drawing its attention towards the affidavit filed by Pramanik. “The BJP has fielded a person who has eleven non-bailable charges against him to serve the people of Coochbehar. We have already brought it to the notice of the ECI,” North Bengal Development Minister Rabindranath Ghosh said on Tuesday.
Pramanik has been booked for murder, attempt to murder, dacoity, human trafficking, Ghosh said quoting the affidavit filed by Pramanik before the ECI. Out of the eleven non-bailable cases two have been filed in other States.
“He is charged with looting a bank and a jewellry shop at Alipurduar,” Ghosh said wondering “how a party which claims to give good governance can nominate a person who has such grievous charges against him dismissing the BJP allegation that the charges were the result of the TMC’s vendetta politics against the Opposition leaders. “If such was the case then how could he have been booked in other States where the Trinamool is not in power,” Ghosh said adding “even the High Court has rejected bail applications filed by him in two cases.”
Yet another political turncoat to be fielded by the Bengal saffron outfit, Pramanik had earlier left the Trinamool Congress to join the BJP.
His organsational capabilities apart, Pramanik’s alleged criminal records could pose his party some problem in Coochbehar constituency bordering Assam and Bangladesh. This, notwithstanding the fact that the BJP has fast come up to gain the second position displacing the Left Front in this district. In the last Assembly elections the BJP had taken a lead over the TMC in the urban areas whereas the latter had posted a lead in the rural belt. Considering the recent electoral patterns a slight shift in the vote base could affect either parties much, experts said.
Controversies hit the BJP in another constituency, this time Basirhat in south Bengal where party candidate Sayantan Basu was reported against by the TMC for telling a crowd that “we will ask the CRPF through our central leadership not to shoot at the legs but directly through the chest if the mischief mongers come to capture booths. This time round no Sahjehan or Aurangzeb will come to save the TMC’s goon.”
