KOLKATA: The high voltage campaign for the first of the seven-phase Lok Sabha elections in West Bengal concluded on Tuesday.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi of the BJP, West Bengal chief minister and TMC supremo
Mamata Banerjee, and top leaders of the Congress and Left parties have campaigned for this phase in which two seats of north Bengal will go to polls on April 11.
Issues ranging from corruption to communalism, NRC to chitfund scams, and, development to security featured in the speeches of the warring party leaders.
The high-pitched campaign was mainly polarised between Banerjee and Modi.
The Trinamool Congress chief called upon the people to defeat the Modi government while the prime minister urged voters to exercise their franchise in his party's favour.
The first phase electoral battle is going to be held in
Cooch Behar
(SC) and Alipurduar (ST) seats, both having a four-cornered contest among the TMC, the BJP, the Congress and Left Front constituents Forward Bloc and Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP).
The TMC has fielded Paresh Adhikari against the BJP's Nisith Pramanik in Cooch Behar where Piya Roy Chowdhury of the Congress and Gobinda Roy of the FB are also in the fray.
In Alipurduar, the TMC nominated Dasarath Tirkey against John Berla of the BJP, while Mohanlal Basumata of the Congress and Mili Oraon of the RSP will also contest from the constituency.
A total of 18,09,598 electorates will decide the fate of 11 contestants in Cooch Behar, while 16,42,285 voters will choose from seven contestants in Alipurduar.
The Election Commission has made elaborate security arrangements with the deployment of central and state forces to ensure a free fair and peaceful poll.
Polling personnel have already left for 2010 polling stations in Cooch Behar seat and 1834 polling stations in Alipurduar seat.
Besides general election observers and expenditure observers, the poll panel for the first time deployed a special police observer Vivek Dube.
In another first, VVPAT will be used in all polling booths along with the EVMs.