A candidate has used the compartments of a passenger train for campaigning, for which the Election Commission of India’s (ECI) intervention has been sought on the plea that the Model Code of Conduct was violated.

The BJP candidate for the Bishnupur Lok Sabha constituency Soumitra Khan, accompanied by the MLAs of Sonamukhi and Indas of Bankura, Dibakar Ghorami and Nirmal Dhara, boarded an EMU train on Moshagram – Bankura route from Sonamukhi station. They travelled the distance, moving within coaches and urged passengers to cast a vote in his favour. The BJP youth morcha president of East Burdwan, Pintu Shyam, mandal president of Khandaghosh Kaushik Ash also joined him.

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Khan was first elected as an MP from Bishnupur in 2014 as a Trinamul Congress candidate. In 2019, he contested as a BJP candidate and won. Now, the BJP has re-nominated him from the seat. His former wife Sujata Mondal has been pitted against Khan by the TMC this time. The Bishnupur Lok Sabha constituency includes Khandaghosh block of East Burdwan, too. Prasenjit Das, spokesperson of the TMC in Burdwan said, “He’s flouted the EC guidelines by using the coaches of the country’s national transporter and the government premises like the railway station for his poll campaign. We’ve complained to the EC for immediate action against him.”

The poll panel, in April, 2019, had issued notice to the railways asking to withdraw train tickets and tea cups bearing pictures of Prime Minister Narendra Modi as those were flouting the MCC norms. On the ticket issue, the EC had reprimanded the national transporter for delay in mass rolling back from the counters.

Khan, on the charges brought against him by the TMC, reserved his comment.