Kolkata
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has questioned the massive victory margin of Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Abhishek Banerjee in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections from Diamond Harbour, calling it either an “electoral aberration or organised fraud.”
Banerjee had defeated BJP candidate Abhijit Das by over 7,10,000 votes in the South 24 Parganas constituency.
Amit Malviya, BJP’s Information Technology Cell Chief and central observer for West Bengal, claimed that the result was proof of large-scale irregularities. Posting on social media, he said the victory margin reflected “systematic vote-loot” and “brazen contempt for democracy.” He cited an interview with Swapan Mandal, General Secretary of the BLO Aikya Manch, a booth-level officers’ association in Bengal.
According to Malviya, Mandal’s testimony revealed several malpractices — preventing genuine voters from casting ballots, covering EVM buttons of other candidates with black tape, and using votes of deceased or absent people. He alleged that such acts created a false record margin in favour of the TMC.
Malviya further said that Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s opposition to the Election Commission’s Special Incentive Revision (SIR) was linked to these alleged irregularities. “A clean voter list through SIR would destroy the TMC’s fraudulent base,” he claimed, warning that the “Diamond Harbour model” could be repeated in the 2026 Assembly elections.
He urged the Election Commission to conduct a transparent SIR in West Bengal to ensure fair polls and restore people’s trust in democracy.