Boxanagar, Dhanpur ready for by-polls on Tuesday amidst tight security

Stage is all set to conduct the by-polls for 20-Boxanagar and 23-Dhanpur assembly constituencies in Sepahijala district on Tuesday and all the polling personnel with voting accessories and Central Arms Police Forces (CAPFs) have already reached all polling booths of the both constituencies.

The campaigning for both constituencies ended on Sunday. BJP organized mega rallies, road shows, motorbike rallies, and door-to-door campaigns in the district.

Chief Minister Manik Saha led the party's campaign from the front while ministers, MLAs, and leaders joined the campaign trail in the last couple of days, as per PTI reports.

CPI(M) politburo member Manik Sarkar and party's state secretary Jitendra Chaudhury along with leaders campaigned for their candidates, but Tipra-Motha, the main opposition, and Congress stayed away from campaigning making the electoral battle a one-on-one contest.

While, in order to strengthen the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (I.N.D.I.A), comprising 28 anti-BJP parties, the Congress in Tripura will support the candidates of INDIA alliance in the September 5th by-polls.

Pradesh Congress president Ashish Kumar Saha said that the leaders of Congress along with opposition Tipra-Motha and CPI(M) had a meeting after announcement of by-polls and to finalise a strategy to stop the division of anti-BJP votes and  Congress has decided and asked all party supporters and workers to cast their votes in favour of alliance candidates both in Boxanagar and Dhanpur assembly constituencies.

The CPI(M) is happy that the Congress has campaigned in favour of INDIA and that Motha has neither supported the BJP nor put up candidates, ensuring a one-on-one fight between the communist party against the BJP.

BJP's Tafajjal Hussain, who unsuccessfully contested the Assembly election in February, will take on CPI (M)’s Mizan Hussain in the minority-dominated Boxanagar constituency.

The CPI (M) had managed to retain the seat by a margin of 4,849 votes. Mizan is the third son of Boxanagar CPI (M) MLA Samsol Haque who passed away in July causing a vacancy.

On the other hand, Dhanpur is heading for a direct fight between BJP's Bindu Debnath and CPI (M)’s Kaushik Chanda. Political analysts said that two independent candidates who are in the battle are unlikely to make any impact.

The Dhanpur seat fell vacant after the resignation of Union Minister of state, Smt Pratima Bhowmik and in the last assembly elections, Smt Pramita Bhowmik secured a total of 19,148 votes and defeated her rival candidate Kaushik Chanda of CPI (M) 3,500 votes. CPI (M) candidate got 15,648 votes, while, Tipra-Motha candidate Amiya Dayal Noatia got 8,671 votes, which has played a crucial role to lose the strong bastion of CPI (M), which was represented by former Chief Minister Manik Sarkar.

The Sepahijala district magistrate (DM) Dr Vishal Kumar said that the campaign for the by-polls in two assembly constituencies came to an end on Sunday without any trouble and all steps have been taken to ensure fair bypolls on September 5. He hoped that a large number of voters would cast their votes in both constituencies and ECI had taken all measures to conduct the by-elections in a peaceful manner.

The DM also said that a large number of security forces were deployed across both constituencies and appealed to the votes to exercise their franchise without any fear.

Sepahijala, which has a population of around 5.42 lakh people in an area of 1043.04 sq km, is located just beside the Indo-Bangla international border and several parts of the two bypoll-bound constituencies have border villages. As many as 93,234 voters are eligible to exercise their franchise in the bypolls—43,087 in Boxanagar and 50,147 in Dhanpur—from 7 AM on Tuesday to 4 PM. The electorate includes 160 service voters and 1,217 voters aged above 80, who can vote from their homes by using postal ballots.

Out of the total 110 polling stations, 59 polling stations in Dhanpur, nine were identified as “critical” and 19 others as “vulnerable” based on previous years’ records. In Boxanagar, nine of the 51 polling stations were marked “critical” and 15 others “vulnerable”, where double the number of paramilitary forces will be deployed, he said, adding around 2,500 CRPF and Tripura State Rifles (TSR) jawans have been deployed for the polls.

Dr Kumar, who is also the district electoral officer, said that the entire Sonamua subdivision, which covers the two Assembly segments, was declared a “high-security area” and that all internal roads as well as entry and exit points were being monitored to make sure nobody illegally influences the voters.