Kolkata: An estimated 45 per cent polling was recorded till noon in the fifth and final phase Assembly election to 49 seats in six northern districts of West Bengal.
Polling started on a brisk note on Monday morning. With the weather looking up after Sunday night's squall bringing much needed respite, people from all walks of life, particularly tea garden workers, were seen queuing up in front of several booths to exercise their franchise.
Chief Electoral Officer, Debasish Sen said, no untoward incident had been reported so far and polling was going on smoothly.
The voters included a sizable number of women and the youth, exercising their franchise for the first time.
A total of 8,16,4210 voters, including 3,89,7456 women, will exercise their franchise across Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri, Cooch Behar, North and South Dinajpur and Malda districts to decide the fates of 306 candidates.
Some of the candidates are Municipal Affairs Minister Ashok Bhattacharya, Forest Minister Jogesh Burman, Relief Minister Hafiz Alam Sairani, Jail Affairs Minister Biswanath Choudhury, Civil Defence Minister Srikumar Mukherjee, Food Processing Minister Sailen Sarkar and Minister of State for PWD Dasarath Tirkey.
More than 50,000 Central Para Military Force jawans are manning 9089 polling booths and guarding vital installations.
Like the previous rounds of polling, digital cameras have been installed in polling booths to take photographs of voters without photo identity cards and also of any untoward incident.
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