The Congress on Saturday released the first list of 13 candidates for the eight-phase West Bengal Assembly elections scheduled to start from March 27. The list has names of the candidates for the first and second phases of the polls.
According to the list, Nepal Mahato, the deputy leader of the Congress Legislature Party, will contest from the Baghmundi seat while Partha Pratim Banerjee will be in the fray for the Purulia seat. The Congress had won both these constituencies in the 2016 Assembly elections.
The Congress is set to contest 92 of the 294 seats in the Assembly, according to PTI. Seven of the 13 Congress contestants, whose names have been announced, are first-time contestants.
The party, however, did not announce a candidate for the Nandigram seat in Purba Medinipur district, where Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is pitted against her former Cabinet colleague and turncoat Suvendu Adhikari. There are speculations that the Congress and the Left Front will leave the seat for their alliance partner, the Abbas Siddiqui-led Indian Secular Front, as the constituency has a significant number of minority voters, according to the news agency.
The announcement came hours after the Bharatiya Janata Party released its list with 57 names. On Friday, the Trinamool Congress announced the complete list for the elections to the 294-seat Assembly.
The elections to the 294 seats in West Bengal will be held in eight phases from March 27 to April 29. The results will be declared on May 2. The state will see a three-cornered fight between the Trinamool Congress, the BJP and an alliance between Left parties, Congress and the Indian Secular Front.
According to the announcements made so far for the seats in the first and second phases of the polls, the Left Front will contest 38 seats, followed by the Congress in 13 and the Indian Secular Front, or ISF, in five. The ISF has been given the Mahisadal, Chandrakona, Raghunathpur, Saltora and Raipur seats. The Congress has been allotted the Purulia, Bhagabanpur, Balarampur, Baghmundi, Bankura, Bisnupur, Kotulpur, Patharpratima, Kakdwip, Moyna, Kharagpur Sadar and Sabang seats.
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