Bengal: Panchayat polls turn violent, CPM candidate's husband killed

The second phase of panchayat polls in West Bengal was marred by violence as a CPI(M) candidates’s husband was killed after a crude bomb was hurled at him in Asansol. The incident took place early this morning when Mohammad Sheikh Hasmat, the husband of Manohra Bibi, CPI-M candidate of the Madhudanga gram panchayat in Burdwan, was on his way to the polling booth. [caption id=“attachment_955171” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Reuters[/caption] Villagers managed to catch one of the attackers who was then reportedly beaten to death. Singur and Nandigram, known for the intense protests against farmland acquisition that caused the ouster of the long entrenched Left Front government and propelled Mamata Banerjee to the chief minister’s chair, went to the polls in the second phase of West Bengal panchayat polls today. While 95,25,320 voters are eligible to choose their representatives in the three districts covering 10,637 gram panchayats, 2047 panchayat samities and 185 zilla parishad seats, all eyes will be on Singur in Hooghly and East Midnapore’s Nandigram — which gained national and international spotlight during the last lap of the Left Front’s rule. A report from east Midnapore district quoting police sources, said that that a bomb was hurled at booth no 29/1 at Nandigram after a clash between ruling Trinamool Congress and Congress workers. A Congress worker got head injuries when a clash broke out there. At booth nos 145 and 146 in Mahisadal, there was a scuffle between TMC and CPI(M) supporters. Some booths were also jammed at Moyna after which the police intervened. At Patashpur, a house of a CPI(M)candidate’s agent was ransacked last night. With inputs from PTI