Four TMC heavyweights in fray for S Kolkata seats today

Kolkata: Four South Kolkata seats, where heavyweight Trinamool Congress (TMC) candidates are in the fray, will go to polls on Monday.

Veteran TMC leader Subrata Mukherjee will face Fuad Halim of Sanjukta Morcha and Loknath Chattopadhyay of BJP. Mukherjee is celebrating his golden jubilee in electoral politics. At the age of 27, he was elected as an MLA in 1971 and became the youngest member in Sidhartha Shankar Roy's cabinet. Later, he became an MLA from Jorabagan seat in 1982, 1987 and 1991. Again, he was elected from Ballygunge Assembly seat in 2011 and 2016.

Both TMC and BJP candidates are observing their inaugural debut in the Assembly election from the Rashbehari seat. Debashis Kumar of TMC, who has been an effective councilor of KMC, will face Subrata Saha, a retired Lieutenant General of the Indian Army. Saha is a voter of Asansol North Assembly seat.

Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay, three-time MLA, is contesting from Bhowanipore after the two-time MLA from the seat Mamata Banerjee vacated it to contest from Nandigram Assembly constituency. Bhowanipore will witness electoral battle between Sobhandeb Chattopadhyay and Rudranil Ghosh of BJP. In the 2019 Lok Sabha poll, TMC was ahead of BJP with 3500 votes on the seat.

Firhad Hakim will face Awad Kishore Gupta of BJP on Kolkata Port Assembly seat. The Port seat came into existence after delimitation in 2011. Three Assembly seats, Kabitirtha, Alipore and Gardenreach were merged to create the constituency. Eight wards of Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC), namely 75, 76, 78, 79, 80, 133, 134 and 135, constitute the constituency.

Hakim is a two-time MLA from the seat.