The Election Commission made elaborate security arrangements for the fifth phase of elections as seven parliamentary constituencies go to polls on Monday.
ECI Special Police Observer said all the booths of the seven parliamentary constituencies would be manned by the central forces. The constituencies where elections would be held are Hooghly, Arambagh and Serampore in Hooghly district, Bangaon (SC) and Barrackpore in North 24 Parganas and Uluberia and Howrah in Howrah district.
On the whole 578 companies of CAPF will man 13,290 booths on the Monday’s polls when about 1 crore 16 lakh 91 thousand and 900 voters will decide the fate of 83 candidates in a four-cornered contest featuring TMC, BJP, Left Front, Congress. Other parties like SUCI, BSP and PDS have also fielded their candidates in the elections.
All the seven seats, which are spread across North 24 Parganas, Howrah and Hooghly districts and parts of Nadia district, will see a four-cornered contest between Trinamool Congress, BJP, Congress and the Left Front major CPI(M).
Among the notable candidates whose fates would be decided on Monday are TMC’s Dinesh Trivedi who is pitted against the BJP’s Arjun Singh who left TMC last month to join the saffron outfit, BJP’s Locket Chatterjee contesting from Hooghly and TMC’s Kalyan Banerjee. CPI(M)’s Alokesh Das is contesting from Bongaon.