A large number of enraged residents came out and staged a sit in protest at the entrance of the Chandel DC Complex demanding legal action against the culprits who allegedly disrupted the polling process at the 12-D/Q DCC of 12/4 Kanakhu Primary School polling station by threatening the presiding officer and destroying ballot boxes and ballot papers, as well as disqualification of the candidates who incite these culprits at the recently concluded ADC election. A memorandum was also submitted to the Chief Election Officer/ State Election Commission through the District Election Officer by the protesters. Voters from Dampi Village, Kanankhu Village and Kurkam Village who poled at the 12/4 Kanankhu polling station displayed placards with slogans such as ‘Arrest the culprits immediately’, ‘we strongly condemn shifting of polling station’, ‘disqualify candidates who are supporting the culprits’, ‘we want peaceful, free and fair election’, ‘find the reality-we want justice’, and ‘we condemn external disturbances’. According to the protesting voters, at around 1 pm, the PRO of 41-Chandel A/C MLA and NPF Chandel unit vice-president Ps.Mono and other workers came to the polling station along with St. Revarson, Ps.Ngamnahring and started damaging the ballot boxes by spilling ink on the boxes without any active resistance from the security personnel deployed at the station to the misdeeds of the NPF agents / volunteers which disrupted the polling process. Polling resumed only after additional security forces were deployed much later. Afterwards, Returning officer the ballot boxes, along with the presiding officer and polling officers were escorted to chandel police station. The very next day, a few unidentified persons came to the residence of Mr.Arunkumar and threatened him of dire consequences if the report he submitted is not being revised according to their wishes. Alleging four candidates- Ps.Ngamnung(NPF), Sr.Ngamhlung(BJP), Ht.Kilaching(IND) and Hi.David(IND) to be the masterminds behind the incident. Meanwhile, chiefs of the three villages issued a joint declaration which states that only voters will be allowed to enter the polling campus on the day of the repoll and the responsibility of any untoward incident arising out of non compliance of the declaration will be borne by the unauthorised individual/s.
