India, the world's largest democracy, has gone into long-phased voting from Saturday as it had kickstarted what will become an election month with the entire month of April would host five assembly polls. The states of West Bengal, Assam, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and the semi-state of Puducherry will go through the crucial assembly polls and they had gained more significance in the fashion of the parliamentary elections. 

Over 16 crore voters from these states would queue up before the polling stations to cast their votes for electing a new government. The race of the reign has been accelerating unprecedently between the political parties and these states have been witnessing large-scale campaigns from both the national and state political leaders to display their allegiance to the people by unveiling a slew of promises in their manifestos. The polls in these five states hold importance as the country is witnessing the first assembly polls since the COVID-19 outbreak and amid the second wave of the pandemic. 

Taking up a Himalayan task, the Election Commission of India (ECI) is on an acid test to conduct the polls smoothly. While Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Puducherry go for the single-phase poll on April 6, West Bengal and Assam will go into eight-phased and three-phased polls respectively. This is the first time that West Bengal will go through eight-phase polls for its 294 assembly seats and it is one of the pivotal polls where the Central ruling BJP is staunchly working to take over the reign from TMC's Mamata Banerjee. 

In what can be spelled as the race at its best, West Bengal is on a ring of fire and the state had witnessed several shocking developments including an alleged attack on Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. Though some of the pre-poll surveys predicted that Mamata Banerjee would win the polls and form the government for the third consecutive time, she is in the necessity to have a strong revival in the state by curbing the rise of BJP. Besides being the opposition party, Mamata had recently developed a strong feud with the Central ruling BJP after some of her legislators had switched side and joined BJP. 

Mamata had contested and won from Bhabanipur in the 2016 polls and this time, she will be contesting from the Nandigram constituency, to take on Suvendu Adhikari, a former ally of Mamata and MLA of Trinamool Congress who had recently quitted the party and joined BJP and he will be contesting from Nandigram. As many TMC legislators and members followed Adhikari and joined BJP, Mamata had decided to take him from Nandigram. On the other side, BJP plans to paint the state saffron by cultivating the disappointments of Mamata's decade-long rule as the votes. As the Modi and Amit Shah duo mulls to oust the Mamata's regime, the political observers say that the first phase is a must-win for Mamata to end up with a clear and strong majority in the assembly and to earn the potent vote share to retain the stronghold that was drifted by the Central ruling party. 

Amid Mamata's feud and BJP's plan, West Bengal has on Saturday begun its voting as the state is going through the first phase of the elections. Thirty assembly seats in five districts would go for the polls on Saturday - March 27. According to reports, BJP has a stronghold in these thirty seats as the Central ruling party has performed exceptionally well in the 2018 local body elections and the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Of these thirty seats, nine seats are from Purulia district, four from Jhargram, four from Bankura, six from East Midnapore, and seven from West Midnapore. 

Around 73,80,942 voters will be casting their votes on March 27 and there are 191 candidates on the ballots in these 30 seats. As most of the seats are projected to be vulnerable with the possibility of witnessing untoward incidents, the election commission had deployed 732 companies of Central paramilitary forces for these 30 seats. The survey highlighted that Mamata Banerjee would less likely enjoy victories from these seats as most of them are expected to go for BJP. 

In the 2016 polls, Mamata's TMC had won 27 of these 30 seats while one went to the Left and Congress ended up winning the rest two. However, there was a sudden wave of change in three years as in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, BJP had won 20 seats while TMC shrinked by ten seats. And now, TMC is running short of any guarantee that the party would largely win the first phase as in 2019, some of the seats that TMC had a lead were the stronghold of Suvendu Adhikari, who was then with TMC. In December 2020, he had joined BJP and taken the stronghold in favor of the Central ruling party and this has put TMC to face a significantly harder race to take over the seats. 

As the election fervor is on in all the states, the leaders have been calling the voters to cast their vote. Leaders including Mamata Banerjee and Union Home Minister Amit Shah had urged the people of West Bengal to come out and vote in large numbers. The polling in West Bengal started at 7 am on Saturday and these 30 seats have 191 candidates, including 21 women. The polling will end at 6.30 pm. A total of 73,80,942 people will cast their votes in the first phase. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi took to Twitter and wrote, "Cast your vote against the divisive forces". 

TMC leader Derek O'Brien said, "TMC will win Bengal, and Bengal's daughter (Mamata) will defeat Bengal's traitor (Adhikari) in his own backyard at Nandigram". According to the Election Commission of India, the first phase of polling in West Bengal had witnessed a 14.28% turnout till 9 am as the visuals from these 30 seats had shown a large queue of voters who had lined up to cast their votes. While the first phase will end on Saturday, the rest of the seven phases of polls will be conducted on April 1, April 6, April 10, April 17, April 22, April 26, and April 29 respectively and the climax will be unveiled on May 2, when the results will be announced. 

Voting underway at a polling centre in Purulia for the first phase of #WestBengalElections2021 pic.twitter.com/xI4brrnNsF

— ANI (@ANI) March 27, 2021