TMC won the co-operative bank elections held under central force cover

The Kontai Cooperative Bank elections in West Bengal’s East Medinipur district were held under the supervision of the Central Armed Police Force (CAPF) on Sunday.

In a petition filed by Shankar Bera, the former chairman of Arga municipality, the Supreme Court has ordered the mobilization of the central forces for the election of bank cooperatives. Despite the heavy deployment of central forces and state police personnel, there were sporadic reports of tension and violence in the area. Central forces have been deployed at five locations.

Elections for cooperative banks have started in Kontai, which is the stronghold of the leader of the opposition party, Subendu Adhikari. Shri Adhikari had defeated Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in Nandigram in the 2021 assembly elections. The BJP also won two Lok Sabha seats, Kanthi and Tamluk, for which elections were held earlier this year.

The results were announced on Sunday evening. Out of 108 seats in Kontai Cooperative Bank, the ruling party has won 101 seats, BJP supporters have won 6 seats and independent candidates have won one seat.

Ramnagar Trinamool Congress MLA Ramnagar Giri said the deployment of central forces was a pretext used by the BJP. “The BJP knew from the beginning that they would lose, so they requested to deploy troops at five locations.”

Although there have been reports of mobilization of central forces during elections in West Bengal in the past, this is the first time that central forces have been mobilized for bank cooperative elections.

Kontai Cooperative Bank operates 16 branches in East Medinipur, and West Medinipur districts and is the largest urban cooperative bank in Eastern India.