West Bengal govt makes key poll appointments ahead of EC visit

IAS officers Smaraki Mahapatraand Sanghamitra Ghosh were appointed as the joint chiefelectoral officer and additional chief electoral officer,respectively, by the West Bengal government on Tuesday, a daybefore the full bench of the Election Commission visits thestate to review the poll preparedness, an official said.

The two officials were directed to take over theresponsibilities immediately, he said.

''Both the officials have been asked to be presentduring the visit of the full bench of the EC,'' the officialsaid.

Ghosh is presently posted as the secretary of stateWomen and Child Welfare Department, while Mahapatra is thesecretary in the state Finance Department with the additionalresponsibility of the director of West Bengal HighwayDevelopment Corporation.

The full bench, led by Chief Election CommissionerSunil Arora, will arrive in the state on Wednesday night on atwo-day visit.

On Thursday, they will be holding meetings with ChiefElectoral Officer Ariz Aftab and Additional Director-General(Law and Order) Gyanwant Singh, who is also the nodal officerof the state police.

The EC officials are also scheduled to meetrepresentatives of political parties before meeting officialsof the central and state regulatory agencies.

There will also be a review meeting with divisionalcommissioners, district election officers and senior policeofficers over the assembly elections in the state, sources inthe state poll panel said.

The EC will also be meeting Chief Secretary AlapanBandyopadhyay, Home Secretary HK Dwivedi, DGP Virendra andother senior officials, they said.

Meanwhile, the CEO on Tuesday held a meeting withInspector-General of CRPF PK Singh and Inspector-General ofBSF AK Singh over the availability of security forces duringthe assembly elections in the state, likely in April-May.