Kolkata, Mar 16 (PTI) The Left Front on Monday announced its first list of 192 candidates for the West Bengal assembly elections, with outgoing Rajya Sabha MP Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya and CPI(M) central committee member Minakshi Mukherjee among key nominees.
It is seen as a battle for survival for the CPI(M)-led front in West Bengal, which ruled the state uninterruptedly for 34 years until 2011 and failed to win a single seat in the 2021 assembly polls.
Bhattacharya will contest from Jadavpur constituency in south Kolkata, while Mukherjee, a youth face of the Left Front, will fight from Uttarpara in Hooghly district.
Mukherjee was fielded from Nandigram in the 2021 elections and came third after BJP’s Suvendu Adhikari and Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee.
The Left Front has also fielded Sabina Yasmin from Kaliganj.
Yasmin’s six-year-old daughter Tamanna was killed in a crude bomb blast allegedly from a victory rally during bypoll counting in June last year, which was won by the TMC.
Left Front chairman Biman Bose said the candidates for the remaining seats will be finalised and announced within three to four days.
“The fight this time is against the neo-Fascist forces in the country, the autocratic activities in our state, and the hardships faced by the people owing to these,” Bose said while announcing the 192 nominees at a press conference here.
“We will also be fighting to revive Leftist politics and strengthen Left forces in the state,” he added.
The assembly polls will be held in the state on April 23 and 29, and votes will be counted on May 4.
Bhattacharya, whose term in the Upper House of Parliament expires on April 4, was the mayor of Kolkata from 2005 to 2010.
Of the 192 seats for which candidates were announced, CPI(M) will contest 142, the Forward Bloc (21), RSP (13), CPI (14), RCPI (1) and MCP (1).
Stating that women candidates have been fielded in 28 constituencies, Bose said, more women will be named for the remaining seats.
Bose said CPI(ML)-Liberation and the Indian Secular Front (ISF) will field candidates as associates, adding that apart from these, some independents and important names will also feature on the Left Front’s list.
The ISF, which contested the 2021 assembly polls in a seat-sharing arrangement with the Left Front, won a single seat – Bhangar in South 24 Parganas. PTI AMR MNB
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