The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Saturday ordered the state government to suspend four Kolkata Police officers, including a divisional deputy commissioner, and to begin disciplinary action against them in connection with unrest outside a nomination centre. The incident occurred a day earlier when senior BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari and other party candidates submitted their nomination papers amid clashes and alleged slogan-shouting by workers of the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC).
A senior Election Commission official stated that the ECI has instructed the state government to suspend four officers and begin disciplinary action against them: Siddhartha Dutta, deputy commissioner-II of the South Division; Priyankar Chakraborty, officer-in-charge (OC) of the Alipore police station; Chandi Charan Banerjee, additional OC; and Saurabh Chatterjee, sergeant.
On Thursday, Union home minister Amit Shah accompanied Adhikari—who is running against chief minister Mamata Banerjee from the Bhabanipur constituency—along with Rashbehari candidate Swapan Dasgupta, Ballygunge nominee Shatarupa, and Santosh Pathak from Chowringhee to the Alipore Survey Building to file their nomination papers. This followed Shah’s address at a rally in Hazra, located barely 300 metres from the chief minister’s Kalighat residence.
Violence erupted after local TMC workers assembled on both sides of the road and raised anti-BJP slogans, allegedly directed at Adhikari, who defeated Banerjee in Nandigram in 2021. TMC supporters had reportedly set up loudspeakers around the Survey Building and played the party’s campaign songs.
