The Calcutta High Court on Tuesday disposed of petitions filed by the Opposition Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party seeking an extension of dates to file nominations for the Panchayat elections, The Indian Express reported. The last date to file nominations was April 23.

Kalyan Banerjee, the lawyer for the ruling Trinamool Congress, said the West Bengal State Election Commission had contradicted the BJP’s claim that the party could not file nominations due to violence by showing how many such nominations had been filed. The bench then called the pleas “not entertainable”.

The Congress said it would approach a division bench of the court against the order. State BJP General Secretary Pratap Banerjee, on the other hand, claimed the party had moved the court “for a free and fair election”. “It is not about winning and losing in court. It is about registering our protest,” he said.

The court also directed the state poll body to allow candidates to file nominations of nine candidates through WhatsApp, News18 reported. The court’s order came after Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Red Star leader Sharmishtha Chowdhury filed a petition claiming that the party’s candidates were not allowed to enter Bhangar block in South 24 Parganas district to file nominations.

“We sent our nominations through WhatsApp to the block development officer just to keep a record,” she told News18. “Today, the High Court has asked the poll body to accept our nominations through WhatsApp. It also asked the poll body to submit a report on April 30.”

The Congress and the BJP both welcomed the court’s decision to allow filing of nominations through WhatsApp.

‘No nominations acceptable via e-mail’

Meanwhile, Justice Subrata Talukdar, who is hearing this case, disposed of a petition by the CPI(M) seeking a direction to the West Bengal State Election Commission to accept nominations that were sent via e-mail, PTI reported. The High Court on Wednesday observed that no special circumstance had arisen to allow nominations to be filed through e-mail. The judge reiterated that it did not want to interfere in the election process.

Representing the CPI(M), advocate Bikash Bhattacharya argued that the Information Technology Act allowed forms to be submitted via e-mail. He also pointed out that nominations accepted through WhatsApp.

The West Bengal State Election Commission has not yet finalised the dates for the Panchayat polls, despite a meeting on Tuesday between the officer on special duty for the state panchayat department, Sourav Das, and West Bengal State Election Commissioner AK Singh.

The Panchayat polls were earlier scheduled for May 1, May 3 and May 5. The nominations will be examined on Wednesday, and the last date for withdrawing them is April 28.