By-poll over , it's time for exit poll

Statesman News Service

MALDA, Sept. 17: Malda election officials said that 77.51 per cent voters’ turnout was recorded in yesterday’s Lok Sabha by-poll here. Over 85 per cent votes had been polled in 144 polling stations, the Malda SDO, Mrs Arunima De, said. In the last Lok Sabha election, the turnout was 80 per cent in Malda, and the late Ghani Khan Choudhury had been elected by a margin of over one lakh votes. On the other hand, it was also learnt that 100 per cent turnout was recorded at eight polling stations at English Bazaar town, and zero per cent at two polling stations at Kaliachak. What stunned the political leaders was the fact that no poll boycott had been called for at the two polling stations at Kaliachak where zero per cent turnout was recorded. Meanwhile, with counting scheduled for Monday, political parties have started making victory claims. While the Congress leaders are hoping that their candidate Mr AH Khan Choudhury will win the Malda Lok Sabha by-poll by a margin of over 25,000 votes; the CPI-M leaders have claimed that Mr Sailen Sarkar will emerge victorious from the seat by a margin of 7,000 to 15,000 votes. This was for the first time that the CPI-M and the BJP played communal cards here to take on the Congress. It was alleged that during the polling yesterday, a large number of BJP supporters at Bamongola and Habibpur, realising perhaps that the BJP candidate has no chance of winning, started casting their votes in favour of the CPI-M’s Hindu candidate in a bid to ensure the defeat of the Congress candidate. The Congress leaders, however, refuted the allegation. Mr Goutam Chakraborty, sabhadhipati, Malda Zilla Parishad, said: “Realising that their candidate is set to lose, the CPI-M has started playing communal cards to malign the image of the late Ghani Khan Choudhury and his family. People know the secular image of the late Khan Choudhury.” With Mr AH Khan Choudhury having an edge, frustrated CPI-M workers alleged that in many places the Congress workers had campaigned showing Osama Bin Laden’s photograph and told them that a Muslim candidate should go to New Delhi as people’s representative from Malda.” “We are strict against communal violence,” a DYFI leader said. Rumours were also being circulated in the run-up to the polls that a temple would be constructed at Pandua, a historical place at Gazole, demolishing an ancient mosque. Senior district CPI-M leaders, including the state minister and the CPI-M candidate for the Malda Lok Sabha by-poll, Mr Sailen Sarkar, while addressing a Press conference, had alleged that hundreds of clerics had been deployed by the Congress to campaign on communal lines. #