Voting for the civic body polls in underway in Tripura amid the backdrop of alleged political violence in the state. Security agencies beefed up security in the state upon directions from the Supreme Court of India.
According to the Inspector General of Police (Law & Order), Arindam Nath, a large battery of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and Border Security Force (BSF) has been deployed in the state apart from the Tripura Police and State Rifles in order to ensure violence-free polling.
"The TSR troopers and police would be deployed in the polling stations and the Central forces would be deployed for area domination and maintaining law and order," Nath told news agency IANS.
As many as 644 polling stations that fall under 20 police stations have been categorized as sensitive and vulnerable, and the deployment of security forces has been done accordingly.
Adequate number of vehicles for mobile patrolling has also been provided to all 20 police stations in eight districts.
A statement from the Tripura police headquarters said, "After the directions of the Supreme Court, additional 15 sections of CRPF are also being provided for the Agartala Municipal Corporation (AMC) and other civic bodies' elections. Special drive has been launched for execution of pending warrants and a total 161 pending warrants have been executed and 433 preventive arrests have been made so far after declaration of the civic polls. Specific cases under appropriate sections of law have been registered in all the reported incidents of political violence. So far 57 political cases have been registered after the declaration of the election (on October 22)."
