West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee, CEC Gyanesh Kumar

The Trinamool Congress on Friday approached the Calcutta High Court challenging the transfer of several IAS and IPS officers by the Election Commission of India after the announcement of assembly elections in West Bengal.Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar has been made a respondent in the petition filed by TMC leader and lawyer Kalyan Banerjee. The petition questions the Election Commission’s decision to transfer officials without consulting the state government. The matter is likely to be heard early next week.The Election Commission had transferred a large number of senior officials, including the Chief Secretary, Home Secretary and Director General of Police, within hours of the announcement of the assembly elections on March 15.Chief Minister of West Bengal Mamata Banerjee It criticized the move on Thursday, calling it “an undeclared emergency” and a “deliberate conspiracy to gain control of Bengal through coercion and institutional manipulation”. “What we are witnessing is nothing less than an undeclared emergency, motivated not by democratic principles but by political vendetta,” he said.Banerjee later wrote to CEC Kumar, urging the Election Commission to refrain from such “arbitrary, unilateral and partisan” action. “The Election Commission has crossed all bounds of decency and constitutional propriety. Since the introduction of the so-called Special Intensive Amendment, the ECI has acted with clear bias, showing little regard for ground realities or the well-being of the people,” the Chief Minister wrote.The Election Commission on Thursday put a stay on some inter-state transfer orders of senior police officers. Bidhannagar CP Muralidhar Sharma and Siliguri CP Syed Waqar Raza, who were earlier asked to go to Tamil Nadu, have been asked to wait. Along with the Tamil Nadu transfer orders of Barrackpore CP Praveen Tripathi and Howrah CP Akash Magharia, the Karnataka transfer order of Birbhum SP Amandeep has also been stayed.Elections for the 294-member West Bengal Assembly will be held in two phases on April 23 and 29, with counting taking place on May 4.