Kolkata:
An electorate of approximately 1.44 crore has begun voting in the crucial third phase of West Bengal Assembly polls spread over three districts of Kolkata and North and South 24 Parganas district to decide the fate of 479 candidates including Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee.
Tight security arrangements have been made with the deployment of over 600 companies of security forces to ensure free, fair and peaceful polling, official sources said.
In all 17,792 polling booths have been set up with 97.47 per cent voters having EPICs, Election Commission sources said.
The 75 constituencies include 11 in Kolkata, 33 in neighbouring North and 31 in South 24-Parganas districts.
Apart from Bhattacharjee, other prominent candidates are Finance Minister Asim Dasgupta, Housing Minister Gautam Deb, Transport Minister Ranjit Kundu, Leader of the Opposition Partha Chatterjee, Kolkata Mayor Sovan Chatterjee, former FICCI secretary general Amit Mitra and cinestar Debashree Roy.
Bhattacharjee is pitted against former state chief secretary and Trinamool Congress candidate Manish Gupta in Jadavpur constituency in South 24 Parganas district, while the former FICCI secretary general is taking on Asim Dasgupta in Khardah in North 24 Parganas.