West Bengal Election Trivia: Hill Areas Under Tension as BJP and TMC Battle for 45 Seats in the Fifth Phase

Election trivia: Bengal began its fifth phase of polling today morning. Narendra Modi urged voters, especially first-time voters in the fifth phase to vote in large numbers.  In Phase 5 of the West Bengal assembly elections, 45 seats across five districts – Jalpaiguri, Kalimpong, Darjeeling, Nadia, North 24 Parganas, and Purba Bardhaman – go into polls. 

By the means of a tweet, he also informed about the by-polls to many assemblies and Lok Sabha seats being held on Saturday and asked people to vote in huge numbers and strengthen the festival of democracy.

His tweet read-” Urging all those voting in today’s fifth phase of the West Bengal elections to vote in large numbers. First-time voters, in particular, should exercise their franchise.”

Over 1 crore voters are eligible to exercise their franchise to decide the political fate of 342 candidates. Security measures have been re-instilled pertaining to the violence in the last phase which witnessed 5 deaths in the Cooch Behar district.

EC has decided to deploy 853 batches of central forces across the districts to ensure free and fair voting. 

The TMC is seeking to recover its lost ground, particularly in north Bengal, amid shifting political allegiances. These are the regions where the BJP gained a significant foothold in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, with the opposition party securing a 45% vote share compared to TMC’s 41.5%.