Kolkata: 12.9 percent voting was held till 9 am on Saturday for Bidhannagar, Asansol, Siliguri and Chandannagar municipal corporations of West Bengal. A senior official of the West Bengal State Election Commission said, “Polling is taking place peacefully. There has been no incident of violence. We have taken cognizance of some disturbances from these municipal areas where outsiders were found standing in the queue of voters.”
He said that in Siliguri, 12.73 per cent polling was recorded in the first two hours, while Chandannagar, Bidhannagar and Asansol recorded 11.62, 13.65 and 13.60 per cent respectively. The police have made elaborate security arrangements in all the four municipal areas located in different parts of the state for peaceful polling, the official said. Outsiders were found standing in the queue of voters in two wards of Bidhanagar and one in Siliguri, the official said.
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“Police have detained Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidates Subhasish Das and Biswajit Mandal in these north Bengal towns for their alleged involvement in creating trouble outside polling stations,” a state election commission official said. ” As per the notification of the West Bengal State Election Commission (SEC), polling will be held till 5 pm and counting of votes for the four municipal corporations will take place on February 14.
According to the SEC website, a total of 203 candidates are in the fray in 41 wards of Bidhannagar, while 200 candidates are in the fray in 47 wards of Siliguri Municipal Corporation. In Chandannagar, 120 candidates are contesting for 33 wards and in Asansol’s 106 wards, 430 candidates are contesting. The Left Front had won the Siliguri municipal elections in 2015, while three other municipal corporations were captured by the Trinamool Congress. (agency)