SB Shashank
Mizoram CEO SB Shashank (centre) addressing media on Mizoram Assembly elections to be held on November 28, 2018. File Photo: Sangzuala Hmar

ECI team led by Deputy Election Commissioner Sudeep Jain at a meeting with the NGO Coordination Committee of Mizoram and church leaders held on Friday in Aizawl agreed to replace the controversial CEO, SB Shashank. The ECI team also agreed that the Brus settling in Tripura would exercise their franchise in their respective villages in Mizoram.

The NGO coordination committee demanded that 11,232 Bru voters lodged in six Tripura relief camps be allowed to exercise their franchise at their respective polling stations in Mizoram and not in Tripura as committed by poll panel in 2014.

Mizoram witnessed a protest on Tuesday and Wednesday. The protest meeting passed a resolution demanding the immediate transfer of CEO SB Shashank. The meeting also resolved that the Brus settling in Tripura should cast their votes inside Mizoram only.

Sources said that in the meeting with Deputy Election Commissioner Sudeep Jain civil society organizations vowed to keep the tradition of peaceful elections of Mizoram and said they would sincerely work together so that free, fair and peaceful election can be held in Mizoram.

The meeting however could not ascertain the return of Lalnunmawia Chuaungo, the ousted principle secretary of Mizoram.

On Tuesday, thousands of protesters, comprising men, women and student association members, held placards and shouted slogans demanding immediate removal of Shashank for his alleged “divisive” style of functioning even as the deadline set for his ouster expired on November 5.

The NGOs, led by the influential Young Mizo Association (YMA), had sought Shashank’s exit in the wake of the Election Commission (EC) removing the principal secretary (home) Lalnunmawia Chuaungo after the CEO had reportedly complained of “direct interference” by the state government in preparation for the November 28 Assembly polls.

Sangzuala Hmar is Northeast Now Correspondent in Aizawl. He can be reached at: [email protected]