The state presidents of the Congress, CPI-M and BJP, along with the national general secretary of the saffron party, have been served notices by Tripura’s Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) over tweets from their respective parties’ official Twitter handles on polling day urging people to vote for them.
In one of the total four notices issued, the parties were asked to submit their explanation by Friday 5pm and were also directed to take corrective action at the earliest.
In the notices, seen by News18, the CEO said that Section 126 (1)(b) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 prohibits display of any election matter by means of cinematograph, television or other similar apparatus in polling area for a period of 48 hours that end with the last hour of voting in the polling area.
Further, Sub-section (3) of Section 126 explains ‘election matter’ as any matter intended or calculated to influence or affect the result of an election.
The four notices cited the tweets by each of the parties which violated the rules.
The Tripura unit of the Congress appealed for “vote in favour of INC” with a tweet from the ‘Tripura Congress’ handle at 11:42 am on Thursday. “People of Tripura spontaneously casting vote for Congress. This time Congress will come,” the notice quoted the tweet as saying.
The BJP tweeted a similar post at 9:50am. “The tweet is in form of a photo containing the following message: Unnato Tripura Sreshtho Tripura Vote for BJP,” another notice said.
The Tripura BJP handle tweeted at 8am. “The tweet followed by a video clip is as under: For a safe and brighter future, vote for BJP,” the notice said.
In the notice to the CPI(M) state president, the CEO said an appeal for vote against a particular party/alliance was tweeted from the main handle at 8:33pm on Wednesday. “The tweet followed by a video clip is as under: Tripura under the BJP-IPFT rule has reached the verge of collapse in all respects, financial, social, cultural and political, Defeat BJP, Elect a Pro-people government,” the notice said.
In each of the notices, the CEO said the respective tweet has been taken as a violation of Section 126 (1) (b) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951.
Section 126 (2) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 states that any person who contravenes the provisions of sub-section (1) shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to two years or with fine, or with both.
Tripura is the first north-east state to go to polls this year. It will be followed by Meghalaya and Nagaland on February 27, and the counting of votes will be held on March 2.
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