The Bharatiya Janata Party secured a sweeping victory in the Falta Assembly constituency in West Bengal on Sunday, with party candidate Debangshu Panda winning the repoll by a margin of more than one lakh votes in what was long considered a stronghold of the Trinamool Congress.
Debangshu Panda polled 1,49,666 votes, comfortably defeating Sambhu Nath Kurmi of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), who secured 40,645 votes. Congress candidate Abdur Razzak Molla finished third with 10,084 votes, while Trinamool Congress nominee Jahangir Khan, who had announced his withdrawal from the contest days before polling, slipped to fourth place with 7,783 votes. The final victory margin stood at 1,09,021 votes.
Fresh polling across all 285 booths in the South 24 Parganas constituency was conducted on 21 May after the Election Commission of India countermanded voting held during the second phase of the Assembly elections on 29 April over allegations of EVM tampering and electoral irregularities.
Counting of votes began on Sunday at Diamond Harbour Women's University amid heavy deployment of security personnel. Officials said the repoll recorded a turnout of more than 87 per cent among the constituency’s 2.36 lakh voters. Around 35 companies of central forces were deployed to oversee the voting process.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated Panda and BJP workers in West Bengal following the result. “Congratulations to Shri Debangshu Panda Ji for winning in Falta by a record margin. It indicates the unwavering faith of the people of West Bengal towards the BJP,” Modi wrote on X. “People are seeing the exceptional work of the West Bengal Government across sectors and thus have decided to further bless us. My compliments to all BJP Karyakartas across West Bengal for their outstanding work. We will keep working for West Bengal’s progress in the times to come,” he added.
West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari hailed the result as a major political message against the Trinamool Congress. In a strongly-worded post on X, Adhikari said: “The notorious ‘Diamond Harbour’ model has turned into the ‘Trinamool’s Loss-Bar’ model.” He thanked voters in Falta for handing the BJP what he described as a historic mandate. “I had appealed to them to secure victory for BJP’s candidate by a margin of one lakh votes, and the winning margin has surpassed one lakh eight thousand. Through development, we shall repay this debt to you. We are committed to building a golden Falta,” he said. The BJP leader also launched a sharp attack on the Trinamool Congress, alleging that the party had operated like a “mafia syndicate”. “A party devoid of principles or ideals, which had morphed into a mafia syndicate, has had its skeletal state laid bare upon losing power,” Adhikari wrote.
Meanwhile, Abhishek Banerjee raised serious concerns over the counting process and alleged irregularities during the repoll. In a lengthy statement, Banerjee questioned the speed at which counting was completed. “The Falta AC repoll counting today exposes glaring inconsistencies. By 3:30 pm all 21 rounds were completed. On 4 May, till the same time, only two to four rounds had taken place. The country deserves an explanation from the ECI,” he said. Banerjee also alleged that over 1,000 Trinamool workers had been forced to flee the constituency in recent days and accused the Election Commission of ignoring attacks on party offices despite the Model Code of Conduct being in force.
He further alleged that counting agents from opposition parties, except the BJP, had been removed from the counting venue by officials and central forces. “This is deeply alarming and strikes at the heart of free and fair elections,” Banerjee said. Calling for accountability, he demanded an independent audit of CCTV footage from the counting process. “Unless compromised officials are held accountable and an independent CCTV audit of the counting process is conducted, questions over the credibility of the mandate will only grow stronger. The truth cannot be suppressed forever,” he added.
