Since 2019, Violence Has Prefaced Elections in Cooch Behar. This Time, Voters Say ‘Enough is Enough’

Elections are not a particularly happy occurrence for the people of Cooch Behar district in north Bengal. Having suffered large-scale violence before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the 2021 Assembly elections and the 2023 Panchayat elections, there is an air of foreboding among voters here ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

The CISF firing incident during the Assembly polls at Sitalkuchi in 2021, which killed four youths and, subsequently, created a massive political dust-up bears testimony to the vulnerability to poll-related violence in this Bangladesh-bordering district. Rafiqul Islam is a teacher at the Jorepatki Mathabhanga MSK School where the incident unfolded.

“This is now a peaceful area. No incident has taken place since then. We appeal to everyone that there should be peace during polls,” he told News18.

A plaque at the school bears the names of the four people who had died in the 2021 firing.

Nazrul Islam, a local resident, said: “Our area was peaceful. God knows why such an incident took place here. What we require is more central forces. I am sure if the police administration handle everything strictly, things will be fine.”

As with any other state, politics is a mainstay discussions in the tea stalls of Bengal before elections. At one such stall in Cooch Behar, a middle-aged man named Ukileswar Burman told News18: “Whenever an election is declared, we feel scared. There was bombing, firing; is this democracy? Two parties are fighting in every way and we are just sandwiched. This time, we will vote for peace.”

Another local named Keshav Burman echoed Burman’s concerns. “I used to be a Left supporter. But so many cases were slapped against me that I had to stay outside Sitalkuchi. I have sold everything. I sell lottery tickets now. If there is violence on voting day, how will we survive?”

Once considered a fortress of the Left Front partner Forward Bloc, which won the seat for an unbroken 32 years from 1977 to 2009, Cooch Behar constituency currently remains a BJP stronghold, with five of the seven Assembly segments in its kitty despite TMC’s landslide victory in the 2021 state polls.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, BJP’s Nisith Pramanik swung nearly 32% votes to dislodge the Trinamool Congress from this SC-reserved Lok Sabha seat.

Re-nominated as a Lok Sabha poll candidate, Pramanik takes on Jagadish Barma Basunia – TMC’s face of the Rajbanshi community and the sitting MLA of the Sitai – as his prime challenger this time.