Bengal phase 2 polls: North 24 Parganas to see highest CAPF deployment

Kolkata: A total of 142 Assembly constituencies spread across six districts and the state capital Kolkata will go to the polls in the second phase of the two-phase Assembly elections in West Bengal on April 29 under a blanket security cover, with 2,348 companies of central forces to be deployed, including the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF), India Reserve Battalion (IRB) and armed police units from other states.

The highest deployment of central forces will be in North 24 Parganas district with 507 companies, followed by South 24 Parganas with 409 companies.

Hooghly district will see the third-highest deployment at 344 companies, followed by Nadia at 285.

East Burdwan district and Kolkata will each witness the deployment of 273 companies of central forces on polling day.

The lowest deployment of central forces will be in Howrah district, adjacent to Kolkata, with 257 companies.

These central forces will be in addition to personnel from Kolkata Police and West Bengal Police.

“The distribution of central forces has been made on the basis of the number of critical or hyper-sensitive booths in the respective districts, determined from records of poll-related violence in previous elections and other factors such as the presence of international borders with Bangladesh,” said an insider from the office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), West Bengal.

Polling in the second phase on April 29 will be conducted under the close monitoring of 142 general observers (one per Assembly constituency) and 95 police observers.

The first phase of Assembly polls for 152 constituencies was conducted under the supervision of 84 police observers. On Saturday, the Election Commission of India (ECI) announced the appointment of 11 additional police observers, all from other states.

“ECI’s biggest challenge is to ensure that the election is free, fair and violence-free. The first phase of voting was overall peaceful. There were no reports of major violence. The ECI also said there was no need for re-polling in any of the booths across the 152 constituencies that went to polls in the first phase. The Commission is particularly cautious about the second phase, and security has been further tightened,” the CEO’s office insider added.

IANS