West Bengal Gears Up for Fifth Phase of Lok Sabha Elections with Heavy Security

Campaigning for the fifth phase of Lok Sabha elections in seven West Bengal constituencies concluded on Saturday. Over 1.25 crore voters will vote on Monday amidst heightened security. High-profile candidates and star campaigners, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee, participated in the rallies.

Campaigning for the fifth phase of Lok Sabha elections to seven parliamentary constituencies in West Bengal ended at 6 pm on Saturday, a poll official said.

Voting will be held in Bangaon, Barrackpore, Howrah, Uluberia, Serampore, Hooghly and Arambag Lok Sabha seats on Monday from 7 am till 6 pm.

A total of 1.25 crore voters, including 63.51 lakh men, 61.72 lakh women and 348 persons of the third gender, are eligible to exercise their franchise in 13,481 polling stations.

The poll body has identified over 57 per cent of the polling stations as sensitive and decided to deploy over 60,000 personnel of central forces, besides around 30,000 personnel of the state police, he said.

The number of security forces deployed for this phase is higher than any of the four earlier phases in the state. Also, the percentage of polling stations identified as sensitive is much higher than the corresponding figure of 23.5 per cent in the fourth phase, he said.

A total of 88 candidates are in the fray in the fifth phase, with the highest of 15 in Bangaon, where Union minister Shantanu Thakur is contesting against TMC's Biswajit Das for the second term.

In Barrackpore, BJP candidate Arjun Singh is contesting against TMC's Partha Bhowmick and CPI (M)'s Debdut Ghosh.

A total of 14 candidates are in the fray in Howrah, where TMC's Prasun Banerjee is fighting against BJP's Rantidev Sengupta.

In neighbouring Uluberia, TMC's Sajda Ahmed is contesting against BJP's Arun Uday Pal Chaudhary and Congress's Azahar Mollick.

In Serampore, TMC's sitting MP Kalyan Banerjee is fighting against BJP's Kabir Shankar Bose.

In Hooghly, actor-turned-politician Locket Chatterjee of the BJP has locked horns with fellow member of the film fraternity, Rachana Banerjee of the TMC.

Star campaigners, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee and her nephew and party general secretary Abhishek Banerjee, have held rallies for their respective party candidates.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)