SHILLONG, JAN 18: Meghalaya state unit of BJP general secretary Dipayan Chakraborty has alerted his Delhi office of the alleged violation of election code of conduct by the union minister of commerce, industries and textiles Anand Sharma when he announced a scheme on Usage of Agrotextiles in north east region with a five year budget of Rs. 55 crores Thursday in New Delhi when three north eastern states- Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura- are going to polls in February 23 and February 14.
Chakrabarty sent and email to the BJP headquarters Friday on the alleged violation of the code of conduct. He told this website, “It is a clear violation of the election code of conduct, I have alerted by party’s head office and now it depends on the party leaders to decide whether to lodge a complaint with the Election Commission of India.”
According to the Press Information Bureau (PIB) press release dated January 17, Sharma announced the scheme at the inauguration of the second edition of TechnoTex-2013 at Pragati Maidan in New Delhi.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) had already announced the dates for the state legislative assemblies in three north eastern states, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura, in January 11 afternoons.
According to the notification of the ECI uploaded in its website it is clearly mentioned, “The model code of conduct comes into immediate effect from the day it was announced in all the state governments of Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura and the union government itself.”
However flouting the notification the union minister of commerce, industries and textiles went ahead and announced the scheme on Thursday. It appears that the union minister did not seek the permission of the ECI before making the announcement.
In a similar case when the Union Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas wanted to revise the annual cap on subsidized LPG domestic cylinders from 6 to 9 from 3 to 5, the deputy secretary of the ministry requested the clearance of ECI on January 16.
The ECI in its letter uploaded in its website on January 17 the ECI secretary KN Bhar said the commission has no objection to the proposal but cautioned it that there should be no undue publicity in the poll going States.
However in case of the union minister of industries, there has not been no such request to the ECI from announcing the scheme. – By Our Reporter
+ There are no comments
Add yours