A voter turnout of 41.11% was recorded by 11 am in Bengal's first phase polling as per Election Commission of India. The voting started at 7 am. After a bomb blast incident occurred in Bengal's Murshidabad district, AUJP's Humayun Kabir visited the site. However, his visit led to a clash between TMC workers and the police. Security personnel were deployed to control the situation as tensions escalated between party workers and police during the polling process. The police were forced to use mild lathicharge to dispel some of the crowd, but denied that the situation was out of hand.
PTI reported that EVM glitches disrupted voting at a few places in West Bengal on Thursday as polling was underway in the first phase of the assembly elections, officials said. The first act of violence was reported in West Bengal as the first phase of voting was underway in the state. Several people were injured as unidentified people hurled crude bomb in Nowda, Murshidabad district, news agency PTI reported, adding that more details are awaited related to the incident.
Earlier, Suvendu Adhikari, BJP's candidate from Nandigram & Bhabanipur, cast his vote from Nandigram and said that there is no chance of Mamata Banerjee winning the elections if dead and fake voter have been eliminated from the rolls. He also hoped for peaceful elections in the state.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged large turnout for women and youth as voting underway in West Bengal today in 152 of its constituencies across 16 districts of the state in the first phase. The polling time for the first phase of Bengal polls is from 7 am today till 6 pm.
