Desk Correspondent , New Delhi – Four-members of Trinamool Congress (TMC) delegation clashed with Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar in New Delhi on Wednesday. In a brief but explosive meeting that ended with mutual accusations of misconduct and duelling social media posts. The encounter, which lasted just five minutes, centred on TMC’s demand for “bias-free” polls versus the Election Commission of India’s (ECI) insistence on “fear-free” elections ahead of the two-phase West Bengal Assembly polls on April 23 and April 29.

On Wednesday, April 8 TMC delegation led by Rajya Sabha MP Derek O’Brien, along with MP Sagarika Ghose and Menaka Guruswamy, and spokesperson Saket Gokhale visited Chief Election Commissioner’s office, New Delhi. Their goal was to meet Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar and senior ECI officials. Delegates presented an agreement seeking neutrality from election officials and restoration of deleted voter names. The meeting occurred one day after ECI’s Special Intensive Revision deleted nearly nine million names in West Bengal, raising fears of voter suppression ahead of polls. Within minutes into it the meeting took a heated turn. TMC delegates walked out, followed by ECI’s public “straight-talk” post promising “fear-free and violence-free polls.” TMC made a counter-post demanding freedom from “Delhi’s control” and “political bias.”

The confrontation follows ECI’s deletion of nearly nine million names in West Bengal’s voter list revision, including 2.71 million under the controversial “logical discrepancy” category. West Bengal will vote in two phases on April 23 and April 29, with results on May 4. This is the latest flashpoint in the long-running tussle between the ruling TMC and the ECI over the conduct of polls in the state