The polling for the first phase of the Assembly elections in Assam and West Bengal will kick off on Monday amid tight security. Eighteen out of the 294 constituencies in Bengal and 65 out of 126 constituencies in Assam would go to polls on Monday.
In Assam, BJP’s star candidate and Chief Ministerial candidate Sarbananda Sonowal from Majuli, and Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi from Titabor are the candidates in the first phase of polls.
In Bengal, 18 seats in Maoist-affected areas will go to Assembly polls in the first of the six-phase elections. Overall 133 candidates will try their luck from the constituencies falling under the districts of West Midnapore, Purulia and Bankura. Out of these, 13 have been roughly classified as left Wing Extremism-affected areas by the Election Commission where voting will end early by 4 pm due to security reasons.
While the Trinamool Congress Party (TMC) and the left-Congress alliance are the main rival in the State with the BJP looking at bettering its major gains in vote percentage in 2014 lok Sabha polls, the North-Eastern state of Assam is where the BJP is seeking to topple the long and well-entrenched reign of the Congress.
The TMC is looking for a repeat victory in Bengal after ending the left Front’s 34-year-old stranglehold on the State in 2011, as the CPI(M)-Congress alliance hopes to reverse the trend by raising the issues of corruption, Saradha scam and bad-governance under the TMC dispensation. The collapse of an under-construction flyover in Kolkata has also become a hot issue in the poll war in Bengal.
In Assam, the ruling Congress, the BJP-AGP-BPF alliance and the AIUDF are locked in a keen battle to decide the fate of 539 candidates in 65 of the 126 constituencies in the border State where issue of illegal migrants is one of the main poll issues.
The BJP’s campaign called for a ‘parivartan’ (change) to bring development while the Congress highlighted its various achievements, including improvement of the law and order situation during last 15 years of its rule in Assam.
An electorate of 95,11,732 including 45,95,712 women, will exercise their franchise in 12,190 polling stations with the number of hyper-sensitive and sensitive booths yet to be released by the election office in Assam.
The Congress is contesting in all the 65 constituencies in the first phase in Assam while BJP is contesting in 54 and its alliance partners -- the AGP in 11 and the BPF in three--, the AIUDF in 27, the CPI and the CPI(M) in ten each with CPI(Ml)(l) in six along with 60 others of unrecognised parties and 13 Independents.
Security has been tightened across the State with the Indo-Bangla border along Barak Valley’s Karimganj district sealed and more than 40,000 security personnel deployed in the 65 constituencies spread across Upper Assam, hill districts, northern banks and Barak Valley.
More than 48,000 polling personnel have been deployed in the first phase with those in remote areas leaving for their respective polling booths since Friday evening.
The first phase will witness mostly direct contest between the ruling Congress and the BJP-AGP-BPF alliance though the AIUDF has put up candidates in 27 constituencies where the fight is expected to be triangular.
Among the 539 candidates in the fray, 496 are males and 43 women in 45 constituencies of the Brahmaputra Valley, five in the two hill districts of Karbi Anglong and Dima Hasao and 15 in the Barak Valley.
The prominent Congress candidates in the fray are Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi from Titabor, Speaker of the outgoing Assembly Pranab Gogoi from Sibsagar, former Union Minister and prominent tea tribe leader Paban Singh Ghatowar and Assam Ministers Gautam Roy, Sarat Barkotoky, Ajanta Neog, Khorsingh Engti, Siddeque Ahmed, Bismita Gogoi, Sumitra Patir and Girindra Malik among others
The BJP’s star candidates in the first phase are Union Minister and party’s Chief Ministerial candidate Sarbananda Sonowal from Majuli, Jorhat lS MP Kamakhya Prasad Tasa against the Chief Minister from Titabor, sitting MlA Prashanta Phukan Dilip Paul, along with former AGP minister Hiten Goswami and those who joined the party last year, including sitting AGP MlAs Padma Hazarika and Naba Doley, Congress dissident and disqualified MlAs Kripanath Mallah, Bolin Chetia and Pallab lochan Das and former UlFA militant Kushal Duwari.
The run-up to the poll in both the State was marked by a high-pitched campaign with high-profile national and State leaders -- including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and party vice-president Rahul Gandhi -- leading the campaign trail for their respective parties.