North 24 Parganas(West Bengal): Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate from Barrackpore, Arjun Singh claimed his rival from the Trinamool Congress Partha Bhowmick distributed cash on Sunday night to facilitate hooliganism in the constituency on polling day.
"All this is taking place at the behest of Partha Bhowmik. Violating all rules Partha Bhowmick (TMC candidate) distributed money last night. He is doing this to facilitate hooliganism," Bhowmick said speaking to reporters on Monday as voting commenced in Barrackpore.
Responding to reporters on the conduct of peaceful voting in Barrackpore, Bhowmick said, "We will try to have peaceful elections but if that doesn't happen, the (state) government would be responsible for it. That is not my responsibility."
Arjun Singh moved to the BJP before the 2019 election after being denied a ticket by the TMC. Notably, he switched sides many times. After winning the 2019 election from the Barrackpore seat on a BJP ticket he rejoined the TMC three years later. In the 2024 election, Singh was denied a ticket by TMC chief Mamata Banerjee, then he again joined the BJP.
In the 2019 elections, BJP's Arjun Singh won the seat, gathering 4,72,994 votes. Dinesh Trivedi from TMC got 4,58,137 votes. The Barrackpore seat consists of seven assembly segments: Amdanga, Bijapur, Naihati, Bhatpara, Jagatdal, Noapara and Barrackpur. Voting for the fifth phase of the ongoing Lok Sabha elections 2024 began on Monday morning across 49 parliamentary constituencies spread over six states and two Union Territories (UTs) amid tight security and arrangements.
The voting started at 7 am and will continue until 6 pm, with those in line by the closing time still allowed to vote. According to the Election Commission of India (ECI), polling for 35 assembly constituencies of the Odisha legislative assembly will also take place simultaneously on Monday.
As per the ECI, over 8.95 crore voters, including 4.69 crore males, 4.26 crore females, and 5409 third-gender electors, will decide the fate of 695 candidates in the fifth phase of voting. The fifth phase will witness key contests in various constituencies. Leaders such as Rahul Gandhi, BJP leaders Rajnath Singh, Smriti Irani, Rajiv Pratap Rudy, Piyush Goyal, Ujjwal Nikam, Karan Bhushan Singh, LJP (Ramvilas) chief Chirag Paswan, JKNC chief Omar Abdullah, and RJD leader Rohini Acharya are looking for electoral success.
Eight states/UTs going for polls in phase 5 are Bihar, Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh, and West Bengal.
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