Agartala, Nov 7: A total of 1,109 nomination papers were submitted for the November 27 urban local body elections in Tripura, with the ruling BJP accounting for the highest number of nominations at 467, followed by the CPI(M) with 359, the Congress with 232, and Tipra Motha 15, State Election Commissioner Dr Pradip Kumar Chakraborty said on Saturday.
According to the final figures available after the November 6 deadline, a total of 879 candidates filed nominations for elections to 21 urban local bodies across the state.
Of these, 345 candidates were sponsored by the BJP, 263 by the CPI(M), 221 by the Congress, 15 by the Tipra Motha Party and 35 were independents. The remaining nomination papers represented multiple nominations filed by candidates.
Agartala Municipal Corporation (AMC), the state’s only municipal corporation and the largest urban local body, witnessed 192 nomination papers submitted against its 51 wards. The BJP submitted 53 nomination papers, the CPI(M) 62, the Congress 59 and independents 18.
A total of 164 candidates are contesting for the 51 AMC wards, including 51 BJP candidates, 44 CPI(M) candidates, 51 Congress candidates and 18 independents.
In a significant development, five urban local bodies — Ranirbazar Municipal Council, Santirbazar Municipal Council, Mohanpur Municipal Council, Kamalpur Nagar Panchayat and Jirania Nagar Panchayat — received nominations only from BJP-sponsored candidates. These bodies may therefore see uncontested victories for the ruling party, subject to scrutiny and the subsequent withdrawal process.
The State Election Commissioner said scrutiny of nomination papers was underway on Saturday in the presence of candidates and representatives of political parties. The list of validly nominated candidates would be published by the respective returning officers by the evening.
Responding to allegations by the opposition CPI(M) that the State Election Commission had received a High Court order concerning difficulties faced by its candidates in filing nominations, Chakraborty said the commission had not directly received any such order but had been informed through advocates about the court’s direction to the Director General of Police to ensure adequate security.
He said the commission had already received a written complaint from the CPI(M) and had subsequently communicated the matter to the DGP, district municipal officers, concerned returning officers and police authorities.
“Accordingly, the DGP, concerned SPs, SDPOs and officers-in-charge deployed security personnel at the offices of returning officers and along the routes leading to them,” he said.
The commissioner said he had also sought field-level reports from district municipal officers and officials of the concerned municipal bodies, who informed him that adequate security arrangements had been made to facilitate candidates wishing to submit their nominations.
However, he confirmed that no CPI(M) candidate eventually filed nominations in the five urban local bodies where complaints had been received.
The nomination scrutiny process is scheduled for November 7, while candidates can withdraw their nominations until November 10. Polling across the 21 urban local bodies is scheduled for November 27, with counting on December 2.
