The eight-phased polls in West Bengal reaches the halfway mark as voting takes place today for the 44 seats covering Cooch Behar and Alipurduar districts in north Bengal and parts of South 24 Parganas, Howrah and Hoogly in the southern part of the state. Union Minister Babul Supriyo, state ministers Partha Chatterjee and Arup Biswas are among the 373 candidates in the fourth phase.
The fourth phase witnessed high-decibel campaigns by the BJP and Trinamool Congress. While the BJP targeted chief minister Mamata Banerjee, her nephew Abhishek Banerjee accusing them of corruption and "appeasement politics", the Trinamool hit back on the BJP-led central government over recent hike in prices of gas, petrol, diesel, besides plans to disinvest in a large number of central government run PSUs. Ms Banerjee also accused central police forces of harassing and intimidating voters and urged voters to "gherao" them - a remark for which she received a notice from the Election Commission.
A total of 1.15 crore people, including 290 members of the third gender, are eligible to vote in the 44 constituencies spread over Howrah (Part II), South 24 Parganas (Part III), Hooghly (Part II) in south Bengal and in north Bengal's Alipurduar and Coochbehar.
At stake are nine assembly constituencies in Howrah, 11 in South 24 Parganas, five in Alipurduar, nine in Coochbehar and 10 in Hooghly.
