The former Chhattisgarh CM Bhupesh Baghel alleges that thugs of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have stopped him from entering a polling station. Whereby he is given a new opportunity to practice intimidation techniques during the elections. He shared a video of himself exclaiming that although he is a candidate himself, he wasn’t let in his own polling centre by the BJP barricades.
He used social media platform X to exhibit his sadness, for sure, by writing, “Bhupesh Baghel himself is a candidate, and BJP people are stopping him from [going to] the polling booth.” Besides, Baghel detected that the BJP was applying intimidation methods; they were sending personnel to polling booths to bully and scare off voters.
Given his call for peaceful participation, Baghel asked the Congress workers to ensure active voter turnout and speak about the eventual disappearance of the BJP off the face of the state with utmost conviction. Besides, he raised the issue of flagging up EVMs affecting the candidate’s photo clarity and displayed leaders of his own party in a manner that contradicted the actual configuration.
Mr Baghel narrates election day, and the cases brought up by the voters were that his photo was displayed smaller and unclear when it was compared with the photo of other candidates, and this raised suspicions that there was evident favouritism from the electoral machines. However, Baghel was distressed that some voters might have faced hurdles and said that he trusted the reliability of the polls as such obstacles would affect the final result.
This time, Baghel is fighting his luck from the Rajnandgaon parliamentary seat, which has jurisdiction over about eight assembly spaces, with Santosh Pandey, the parliamentarian from the BJP. The election commission estimated voter turnout in Chhattisgarh’s constituencies in the second phase of Lok Sabha elections to reach about 60% by 3 pm, although the campaign was plagued by charges of violence and muscling down the opposition.
Such cases present the picture of how strongly and seriously the electoral process is taking place, and the nominated leaders like Baghel indicate the process to be rigged, and they try to campaign for the party, delivering the message that the party is facing obstacles.
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