West Bengal Assembly Elections 2026| Campaigning for first phase polling ends with heated exchange between TMC, BJP

Kolkata: The campaigning for the first phase of the assembly elections in West Bengal ended with the heated exchange between the ruling Trinamool Congress and its principal challenger, Bharatiya Janata Party, reaching a crescendo on Tuesday.

The Trinamool Congress referred to an alleged ‘taunt’ by Union Home Minister Amit Shah against West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and cited it as an example of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s lack of respect for women.

Altogether 1,478 candidates are in the fray in the 152 assembly constituencies going to the polls in the first phase on Thursday. The constituencies are spread over 16 of the 23 districts in the state, which has a 294-member legislative assembly. The voting in the remaining 142 constituencies will be held in the second phase on April 29.

The Election Commission deployed about 2,407 companies of the central paramilitary force, in addition to local police personnel, to ensure free and fair polls in the constituencies going to polls in the first phase. About 3.60 crore voters are eligible to vote in the first phase of polling, and they include 1.84 crore men, 1.75 crore women, and 465 third-gender voters, according to the Election Commission. The number of voters, however, may go up as the EC would publish supplementary electoral rolls, including the people who were disenfranchised during the Special Intensive Revision of the lists of voters, but whom the appellate tribunals, constituted as per the order of the Supreme Court, returned their voting rights till midnight on Tuesday.

The state’s chief electoral officer, Manoj Agarwala, said that the supplementary electoral roll would be published on Wednesday.

“Areh Mamata Didi, Tera Samay Aab Samapt Ho Raha Hai (Mamata Didi, your time is now up)”, Shah said at a BJP rally at Kulti in Asansol. “Eh Didi…kan khol kar sun lo…Bangal Bharat Me Hai… (Eh, Didi, listen carefully, Bengal is in India)”, he said in another election rally at Salboni in Paschim Medinipur.

The TMC objected to the way the BJP heavyweight referred to the state’s chief minister.

“This is the ‘poriborton (change)’ the BJP seeks to import into Bengal from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. It is not a change; it is a regression in values. An insult to Bengal. An insult to every woman in this state and across the country,” Mamata’s heir apparent and her party’s general secretary, Abhishek Banerjee, posted on X. He recalled Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “Didi O Didi” jibe for the TMC supremo during the campaign for the 2021 assembly elections in the state.

“The prime minister publicly mocks a three-time elected woman chief minister with ‘Didi O Didi’, delivered with visible condescension. The home minister echoes it with ‘Ei Didi’, reducing a respected leader to a taunt,” noted Abhishek, the nephew of the TMC chairperson.

Shah also took a dig at Abhishek on Tuesday, “Bhaipo (nephew) will not be the future chief minister of West Bengal. He has already purchased his ticket to leave the state after May 4 (the day the votes will be counted)”.

“The BJP will not win the elections in West Bengal this time. The TMC will again form the government. We will also throw out the BJP from power in Delhi in 2026 itself,” Mamata said at a rally of her party in Haldia in Purba Medinipur.

The SIR of the electoral rolls dominated the political discourse in West Bengal during the campaigning so far, overshadowing other issues, like corruption, unemployment, misgovernance, safety and security of women, law and order situation, and irregularities in the public healthcare sector, as well as discriminatory policies of the Union Government towards the state.

The TMC accused the EC of acting at the behest of the BJP and deleting a large number of voters through the SIR of the electoral rolls to ensure an edge for the saffron party in the elections. The BJP, on the other hand, defended the revision exercise as an essential process to clean up the electoral rolls, particularly to remove the illegal migrants from Bangladesh and Myanmar from the lists. The party accused the TMC of shielding the illegal migrants.

“No one can threaten our voters. The central forces are in every nook and corner of West Bengal,” the Union Home Minister said.

The TMC, however, criticised the deployment of such a large number of central paramilitary forces, along with armoured vehicles, for the West Bengal polls, calling it disproportionate and an act of intimidation. “This is a classic case of voter intimidation, using amphibious vehicles, armoured cars, and more than 2,400 companies of armed forces. This is done basically to scare the people of West Bengal.”

Mamata, herself, alleged that the BJP had planned to use the central paramilitary personnel for fake voting in at least three municipal wards in her constituency, Bhabanipur, which would go to polls on April 29.