A day after the State Election Commission issued the notification for the first of the three-phase Panchayat poll in West Bengal, state Governor M K Narayanan on Tuesday held a high-level meeting with senior government officials at Raj Bhavan.
State Chief Secretary Sanjay Mitra, Home Secretary Basudev Banerjee and ADG (law and order) Banibrata Basu were among others present at the meeting, which lasted over an hour, Raj Bhavan sources said.
Earlier State Election Commissioner Mira Pandey met Mr. Narayanan to brief him on election preparations by the poll panel as well as the problems of deploying forces in sensitive areas.
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The commission had issued the notification for the first phase after waiting for 12 days for the state government to furnish details of force deployment to the SEC.
Ms. Pandey said that the SEC had not received any information regarding security forces.
“We expect that the state government will let us know by tomorrow at least," she said, adding that all officials who would be involved in the poll process came under the State Election Commission with the notification of the polls.
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