Outgoing West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has alleged large-scale irregularities in the Bhabanipur counting process, describing her defeat to BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari as a “stolen verdict” and an “unethical dirty game” orchestrated by the Election Commission.
The allegations surfaced after Trinamool Congress MP and senior Supreme Court advocate Kalyan Banerjee shared details of a telephonic conversation with Mamata Banerjee on his Facebook page.
In the conversation, Banerjee claimed she was leading until the 16th round of counting, with only a handful of rounds left, when the situation allegedly changed dramatically.
Mamata alleged that “goons” entered the counting centre during the final rounds, intimidated officials and agents, and disrupted the process.
She accused the Election Commission, CRPF, and local election officials — including the district election officer and returning officer — of acting under directions from Delhi to tilt the result in the BJP’s favour.
A central part of her complaint was the alleged removal of TMC counting agents from inside the centre, which she claimed left her party without representation during the decisive final rounds.
“Those remaining rounds were in Bhabanipur, which was totally our area. At that moment, a few goons entered the counting centre with EC officials. They beat up my agents and threw them out with the help of the CRPF,” she alleged during the call.
Banerjee also claimed she was denied entry to the counting hall during the crucial phase.
“I am outside the hall. They are not allowing me inside,” she said.
She further alleged that EVMs were moved back to strongrooms without proper sealing and accused officials of conducting the final stages of counting without transparency.
Describing the episode as “torture”, Mamata alleged that the process was compromised at multiple levels — from voter deletions during the Special Intensive Revision to what she called the forcible theft of votes amid power cuts and confusion inside counting centres.
“This is not a BJP victory. This is an unethical dirty game,” she said, adding that the result amounted to a moral defeat for the opposition.
According to Kalyan Banerjee, the TMC chief has instructed legal teams to prepare a formal challenge, asserting that documentary evidence has been collected to contest the result in court.
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