Sheer number of candidates stretches scrutiny process into day 2 for East and West districts

GANGTOK/ NAMCHI, 03 Oct: The unusually large number of hopefuls this panchayat elections has added to the workload of the Returning Officers with the DC offices keeping busy till late in the evening to complete the scrutiny process scheduled for today. The complaints and objections filed by candidates and aspirants threw up more delays. Each of these complaints and objections need to be examined by the respective Returning Officers, a process which is scheduled to Thursday. While the scrutiny process ended the quickest in North district, which also had the smallest pile to sort through, with South district completing the process late in the evening and final details not at hand for West and East district at the time of going to print.
As DC, North, TW Khangsharpa, informs there has been only one rejection of a candidate’s nomination papers there. This was related to a nomination of an Independent candidate for a panchayat ward in Kabi Tingda. There is also an objection filed by an SDF candidate against an Independent candidate for a Zilla Panchayat ward in Hee Gyathang. This hearing will be taken up tomorrow.
In North Sikkim, a total of 44 candidates have filed nomination papers for the 28 Zilla Territorial Constituencies and 160 for the 111 ward panchayats. From Lachen-Mangan constituency the zilla panchayat contest saw a total of seven candidates filing nominations papers [SDF 04 and IND 03], while for ward panchayats here, 30 candidates filed their nomination [SDF 25 and IND 05]. From Dzongu constituency, for zilla panchayats, 23 candidates filed their papers [SDF 19 and IND 04] and for ward panchayats, 78 candidates [SDF 67 and IND 11]. From Kabi-Tingda constituency, for zilla panchayat a total of 14 candidates filed their nominations [SDF 06 and IND 08] and for ward panchayats, 52 candidates [SDF 32 and IND 20].
In South Sikkim, after the scrutiny of nomination papers, a total of 78 nominations was declared valid for the 28 Zilla Territorial Constituencies and 512 for the 271 ward panchayats.
At the Zilla TC level, 48 of the 51 nominations filed by SDF candidates were declared valid. Meanwhile, with the rejection of an Independent candidate’s papers for Rameng-Perbing Phong territorial constituency, which left only the SDF candidate in the fray, the ruling party has taken its toll of uncontested Zilla TC wins to seven. Six Zilla TCs already had only SDF candidates filing nomination papers and all of them cleared the scrutiny today,
As of now, the 28 Zilla Territorial Constituencies of South Sikkim have 30 Independent candidates left in the fray after nomination papers of four were rejected. With two days still left for withdrawal, this equation could change.
Meanwhile, for the total 271 Gram Panchayat Wards of South Sikkim, for which 791 nominations were received from 521 candidates [391 from SDF and 129 Independents], four  nomination papers of candidates claiming to have SDF tickets were rejected today along with the nomination papers of seven Independent candidates. At the ward level, SDF has already established a strong sweep, having already now bagged 134 wards without contest.
In East district, the scrutiny process should be clear tomorrow due the unusually high number of candidates as well as complaints. It is informed that there are numerous objections filed especially by SDF candidates. On the other hand, it is also informed that there have been a number of rejections of scrutiny papers particularly for the Zilla panchayat seats. There was a huge crowd in the district office with people also ready to protest if their papers got cancelled.
In East Sikkim, the returning officers have to sift through 109 nomination papers [45 SDF, 62 Independents and 2 Congress] for the 32 Zilla Panchayat wards and 730 nomination papers [SDF 428 and Independents 301] for the 290 panchayat wards.
DC West also stated that the large number of candidates has made it near impossible to complete the process today. Here, the 28 Zilla Panchayat wards have received 42 nomination papers from SDF candidates and 47 from Independents; and the panchayat wards have received papers from 409 SDF candidates and 192 Independents.
As per confirmation received from West Sikkim at the time of going to print, all the 89 nomination papers for the Zilla Panchayat wards were accepted, and of the 603 nomination papers received for the 55 GPUs [317 wards], 23 had failed scrutiny [from papers scrutinized till 9:30 p.m.] with the process still far from over.