Bengal Election 2026: Why phase 2 voting today could tilt the race for TMC, BJP

Bengal Election 2026: West Bengal is voting across 142 constituencies in the second and final phase today, 29 April. The high-octane campaigning for this crucial second phase concluded on Monday, 27 April.

The state recorded a voter turnout of 93.2 per cent in the first phase of polling, a record-breaking figure that has led both the Trinamool Congress (TMC) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to claim electoral advantage. The high turnout figures underline an active electoral exercise as polling drew to a close amid tight security arrangements across constituencies.

The results will be declared on May 4, along with Assam, Keralam, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry.

All eyes on 142 seats

All eyes are now on the 142 assembly seats voting today. The voting for 152 seats in the first phase saw a record 93 per cent voter turnout, the Election Commission of India said.

These 142 seats voting in phase 2 are considered the incumbent Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress (TMC)’s core stronghold spread over south Bengal and the Kolkata district.

During the campaign in the run-up to the second phase of elections, Prime Minister Modi said the record voter turnout in the first phase had “put a seal on… the wave of change that had been visible in Bengal for a long time”.

The BJP is looking to breach the TMC’s South Bengal fort as it looks to outdo its 77-seat tally in the 2021 polls. In 2021, the BJP became the principal Opposition in the state for the first time on the back of a strong performance in north Bengal, which voted in the first phase on 23 April.

The election in West Bengal is largely considered a bipolar fight between the incumbent Trinamool Congress(TMC) led by Mamata Banerjee and a resurgent Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

As many as 152 constituencies voted in the first phase of the high-stakes West Bengal elections on 23 April, after a high-octane campaign by all political parties. The 152 seats were spread across 16 districts in north Bengal and parts of south Bengal.

Of the 152 seats voting in phase 1 today, the TMC had won 92 seats in the 2021 polls, while the BJP had won 59 seats.

Why the second phase is crucial for TMC, BJP?

The second phase will see several crucial, high-profile seats go to the polls, including Bhabanipur, where Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is set to take on the BJP’s Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Assembly, Suvendu Adhikari.

The seats that will vote in the second phase cover eight electoral districts, including Kolkata North, Kolkata South, Howrah, Nadia, North 24 Parganas, South 24 Parganas, Hooghly and Purba Bardhaman.

In 2021, the TMC maintained its hold on these seats and won 123 of thel 142 seats. The BJP could only win 18 seats, despite an aggressive campaign. The remaining one seat, Bhangar was won by Left’s ally, the Indian Secular Front’s (ISF).

Nawsad Siddique of the ISF defeated his nearest rival, Rezaul Karim of the TMC, by about 27000 votes in Bhangar assembly constituency in Bengal's South 24 Parganas district. Siddique was the lone non-BJP, non-TMC candidate to win the 2021 assembly election.

While Kolkata North and South together have 11 seats, Howrah has 16, Nadia 17, North 24 Parganas 33, South 24 Parganas 31, Hooghly 18, and Purba Bardhaman 16.

TMC leaders said the record turnout indicated a wave in its favour. “Do you know why voter turnout is so high even after the deletion of so many names? It is because people know that this election is a fight to safeguard their rights. Because after this, they (BJP) will implement the National Register of Citizens (NRC),” Mamata Banerjee said in one of his campaigns.

Mamata, other key leaders in the fray

Key TMC leaders Mamata from Bhabanipur, Kolkata Mayor Firhad Hakim in Kolkata Port, Minister of State for Finance Chandrima Bhattacharya in Dum Dum Uttar, Minister of Commerce and Industries Shashi Panja in Shyampukur, Power Minister Aroop Biswas in Tollyganj, Education Minister Bratya Basu in Dum Dum, and Minister of State for Fire and Emergency Services Sujit Basu in Bidhannagar, among others, are in the fray tomorrow.

The BJP has fielded from Panihati the mother of the junior doctor who was raped and murdered at the RG Kar Hospital in Kolkata in October 2024.

Two senior BJP leaders, former Rajya Sabha member Swapan Dasgupta and actor-politician Rupa Ganguly, have been fielded from Rashbehari and Sonrapur Dakshin, respectively, by the saffron party in the second phase of West Bengal elections.

“It's true that the second phase is where the TMC dominated in 2021. But we also need to take into account the SIR deletions that may have an impact on seats where the margin of victory in favour of TMC was less in 2021,” Dr Mohammad Reyaz, assistant professor at the Department of Journalism and Mass Communication, Aliah University, told LiveMint.

The BJP rise in Bengal

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) started contesting assembly elections in West Bengal way back in 1882. But the saffron party has never been in power in Bengal, where the political landscape, until very recently, has been dominated by the Left, the Congress, and the TMC.

In the last ten years, however, the BJP has experienced significant growth in West Bengal and emerged as the primary opposition to the Trinamool Congress (TMC) by increasing its vote share and winning substantial seats in 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

What happened in the 2021 assembly elections?

The 2021 West Bengal Legislative Assembly elections were held in eight phases between 27 March and 29 April to elect all 294 members of the Legislative Assembly during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The incumbent Trinamool Congress, led by Mamata Banerjee, won the election by a landslide, bagging 215 seats, despite opinion polls generally predicting a close race against the BJP, which became the official opposition with 77 seats.

For the first time in the history of Bengal, no members from the Congress and the Communist Party were elected.