: The fate of 14 candidates vying for two seats in West Bengal will be decided on Saturday when Basirhat Dakshin and Chowringhee Assembly segments go to polls. In all, nine and five candidates are in the fray in Chowringhee and Basirhat Dakshin, respectively.
In central Kolkata’s Chowringhee, 2,00,256 voters and in North 24 Parganas district’s Basirhat Dakshin, 2,35,843 voters will exercise their franchise.
The polling will take place in 222 booths in Chowringhee and 285 booths in Basirhat Dakshin. The Election Commission of India (ECI) has banned both broadcasting and publishing exit polls from 7 a.m. to 6.30 p.m. on Saturday.
The by-polls are taking place at a time when several AITC leaders are being questioned by the Central Bureau of Investigation for their alleged links with the multi-crore Saradha Group’s Ponzi scam. Using this as a means to cut into the AITC’s vote base, the BJP is seeking to make its mark while the Communist Party of India (Marxist) is looking to regain lost political ground.
While the AITC has fielded Nayna Bandyopadhyay, wife of MP Sudip Bandyopadhyay, the BJP has nominated Ritesh Tewari.
The Congress, which had a slender lead in Chowringhee in the general elections this year, has fielded Santosh Pathak for the seat, while the Left Front has nominated CPI (M) leader Faiyaz Ahmed Khan.
In Basirhat Dakshin, BJP candidate Samik Bhattacharya had a lead in the 2014 general elections and has been fielded in the by-polls too. Interestingly, Basirhat Dakshin has a large minority population.
It remains to be seen whether the BJP is able to retain its lead. The AITC has fielded footballer Dipendu Biswas, a native of Basirhat. While Asit Majumdar is representing the Congress, Mrinal Chakraborty has been fielded by the CPI (M).
Security has been beefed up in the constituencies and paramilitary forces have been deployed.
