West Bengal: Kaliganj by-poll to see several firsts

Kolkata: For the first time in West Bengal's Kaliganj by-poll, a special arrangement will be done for depositing the mobile phones of the voters in the jute bags outside the polling booths, webcasting from camera placed outside the booth, live streaming in the vehicles of Paramilitary and Quick Response Team (QRT) and naka checking will be monitored live first time. All these new steps, if done successfully, will be replicated in 2026 assembly polls.

Speaking to ET, West Bengal-Chief Electoral Office (CEO) Manoj Agarwal said, “Several new measures, including depositing mobile phones in jute bags outside polling booths, webcasting from camera placed outside the booth, live streaming in the vehicles of Paramilitary forces on duty and Quick Response Team (QRT) and naka checking getting monitored live will be done for first time in Kaliganj by-poll in West Bengal’s Nadia district.”

" As per the latest ECI guidelines, maximum of 4 voters will be allowed inside the booth at any given time. This will also be implemented for the first time in Bengal and all other states which will go for by-polls on June 19," Agarwal pointed out.


In 309 booths of Kaliganj assembly Constituency in Nadia District, Rs 179 has been spent for each booth for creating the mobile depositing facility. Tokens will be given to the voters, after depositing the mobile phones. The volunteers will guard the mobile phones outside the booth. “The whole model will be replicated in 2026 assembly polls, if successful this time,” Arindam Niyogi, Additional Chief Electoral Officer West Bengal, confirmed.

Taking the initiative of identifying dead voters in various Constituencies, in Kaliganj alone, 945 dead voters have been identified.

West Bengal's Nadia district’s Kaliganj Assembly constituency. The assembly seat will vote on June 19 and the counting of votes will take place on June 23. The bypolls are being conducted in five assembly constituencies of four state- Gujarat’s Kadi and Visavadar, Kerala’s Nilambur, Punjab’s Ludhiana West, and West Bengal’s Kaliganj.

WB-CEO Manoj Kumar Agarwal, Assistant Director (Media) Apurva Kumar Singh, attended two meetings in Kolkata today, including by one with the senior Officials of Directorate of Information under West Bengal government, Press Information Bureau (PIB), Central Bureau of Communication (CBC), All India Radio (AIR), Doordarshan (DD), SRFTI among others.