Garga Chatterjee, the leader of pro-Bengali advocacy group Bangla Pokkho, has been arrested by the Kolkata Police for allegedly spreading misinformation about Electronic Voting Machines ahead of the West Bengal Assembly elections, PTI reported.
Chatterjee was arrested by the cybercrime division of the police following a complaint by an Election Commission official.
Kolkata Police Commissioner Ajay Nand said that Chatterjee posted on social media about alleged EVM tampering and malpractices in the election process, ANI reported. “This caused different perceptions among political parties and also created confusion,” the police chief said.
The police had sent Chatterjee notices twice asking him to appear for questioning, but he did not appear before the authorities, due to which he was arrested, Nand was quoted as saying by ANI.
The Bangla Pokkho chief had raised questions about alleged EVM malfunctions on April 23, the day of the first phase of the election, PTI quoted an unidentified police official as saying. On that day, voting had started late at several booths because of technical glitches.
On May 4, the day of counting of votes, Chatterjee again criticised the Election Commission in a social media post, accused the poll panel of carrying out a “secret plan”, the news agency quoted the official as saying.
The Bharatiya Janata Party won the West Bengal elections on May 4, ending the Trinamool Congress’ 15-year tenure in the state. The BJP won 207 seats, while the TMC won 80 constituencies.
Edited by Neerad Pandharipande
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