Bengal polls 2016: Former CM Buddhadeb does road show after 5 years

Kolkata, April 19: Former West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, who is not contesting the state's Assembly election this year owing to health reasons, campaigned for Left candidates in South Kolkata on Tuesday evening.

Bhattacharjee had taken part in an election road show five years ago in 2011, when he was the chief minister of the state. The road show will cover three constituencies in Kasba, Jadavpur and Tollygunj, all of which fall under the South 24 Parganas district which will go to the polls on April 30.

Bhattacharjee campaigned for Shatarup Ghosh, Madhuja Sen and Sujan Chakraborty---the three Left candidates contesting from Kasba, Tollygunj and Jadavpur constituencies, respectively.

Tuesday is the last day of campaigning for the third phase of polling in the ongoing Assembly election which started on April 4. Seven constituencies in Kolkata besides 55 in other parts of the state will go to polling on Thursday (April 21). [High-profile candidates of April 21 poll phase]

The former CM, who was in office between 2000-2011, was not ready to campaign although he played an instrumental role in forging the electoral tie-up between the Left and Congress to topple the Trinamool Congress government this time. He finally agreed to campaign in Kolkata and the Left supporters believed even a short presence of Bhattacharjee on the streets will boost the cadres' morale. [Top issues of Bengal polls 2016]

Bhattacharjee won from Jadavpur constituency for five times between 1987 and 2006 but lost the 2011 election to TMC's Manish Gupta, a former bureaucrat and the current power minister. Gupta is contesting on the TMC's ticket this year as well and his opponent is former MP from Jadavpur Lok Sabha seat Sujan Chakraborty.

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