Bhattacharjee star candidate in tomorrow's Bengal polling

Kolkata, Apr 26 (UNI) West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and eight of his cabinet colleagues will seek people's mandate tomorrow as arc light falls on Kolkata and its two adjoining districts going to polls in the third phase.

Altogether 12.5 million electorate would exercise their franchise in 76 out of 77 assembly constituencies in the state capital, North and South 24 Parganas to elect representatives from among 485 candidates, including 38 women.

Polling in Bhatpara constituency, which was countermanded following the death of Bahujan Samaj Party candidate will be held on May 16.

Put at stake are the fates of Information Technology Minister Manab Mukherjee, Labour Minister Mohammad Amin, Housing Minister Gautam Deb, Land Reforms Minister Abdur Rezzak Molla, Sundarbans Development Minister Kanti Ganguly, Finance Minister Asim Dasgupta, PWD Minister Amar Chaudhury, Transport Minister Subhas Chakravarty, besides the Chief Minister whose pragmatic and investment friendly image grew taller over the recent time.

Prominent among others are former Mayor Subrata Mukherjee of the Congresss and Bengali film stars Biplab Chatterjee and Tapas Paul locking horns as CPI(M) and Trinamool Congress nominees respectively.

The polling is set to be held amid a very tight security with more than 50,000 central para military force jawans manning all the 13790 polling booths and patrolling streets.

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