Cops at Technicians’ Studio on Saturday
Kolkata: In a first-of-its-kind, police-secured election on Saturday, 1,017 Tolly technicians cast their votes across two film studios in Kolkata to begin the opening phase of polling. Voting for the remaining 11 guilds with 2,441 valid voters will take place at five studios on Sunday. “Many commoners often confuse these polls with Lok Sabha, assembly, or corporation elections, but this process is different, whereby committee members of 23 guilds are being elected following trade union commission or labour commission norms.
Chakraborty told the media “I have made this rule that apart from voters, no one can get inside the studio. There will be no one worse than me if anyone tries to create trouble,” Chakraborty said. Ghosh told TOI that everyone wants clean and transparent functioning in Tollywood. “We have heard of cards being issued for money, and many individuals held multiple cards across various guilds, leaving technicians to wonder if peers collecting daily remuneration actually knew the job at all. ” Ghosh further noted that cards may have even fallen into the hands of individuals who crossed the border from Bangladesh and overstayed, stressing that such names had to be removed.
Staying outside the studio premises, actor and Kolkata International Film Festival (KIFF) adviser Mithun Chakraborty , along with actors and BJP MLAs Rudranil Ghosh and Papiya Adhikary, kept watch to ensure that every eligible voter could freely exercise their franchise to elect committee members for five guilds. So, I too am sitting outside. Voting is happening peacefully. Police have cooperated with us. Forty CCTV cameras have been installed. There is no chance of any wrongdoing whatsoever. No names were struck off from the eligible voters’ list on the basis of whims and fancies. Every trade union commission norm has been followed this time, and no political logo or symbol is used here as co-technicians contest without keeping political allegiance in mind. ” During the run-up to the polls, debates arose over the process used to eliminate fake voters, with some even questioning if Tollywood was trying to adopt an SIR-like model. Saturday’s voting results showed that Somnath Kundu was elected president of the makeup artists’ guild, Bapi Ghosh of the cine video costume guild, Abhijit Saha of the cine and video catwalk and hanging lighting workers of WB guild, and Keshab Chakraborty of the cine writers’ guild, while counting for the cine video assistant directors’ guild was still underway.
Earlier, voting didn’t even happen. Ghosh stated that a transparent process had eliminated all fake voters — many of whom had previously obtained guild cards despite having no connection to Tollywood.