The Election Commission’s early trends in the West Bengal Assembly polls showed that the Trinamool Congress had gained a major lead against other parties on Sunday morning.

Counting of the votes in West Bengal and three other states – Assam, Kerala and Tamil Nadu – and the Union Territory of Puducherry began at 7 am. The majority mark in the 294-seat West Bengal Assembly is 148.

As of 11.10 am, the Election Commission’s data showed that the Mamata Banerjee-led party was ahead in 172 seats while the Bharatiya Janata Party was leading in 87.

Banerjee, who contested from Nandigram against her former aide and TMC turncoat Suvendu Adhikari, was trailing with a margin of 4,728 votes. In 2016, Adhikari had won with a margin of 81,230 votes.

Independent candidates were leading in two seats and the Rashtriya Secular Majlis Party was ahead in one constituency. Meanwhile, BJP ally All Jharkhand Students Union was leading in one seat that it contested in Purulia district’s Baghmundi.

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Among other candidates, TMC leader Madan Mitra is ahead in Kamarhati constituency with a margin of 8,138 votes. BJP leader Anindya Banerjee is trailing with 1,817 votes in this seat.

In the Sitalkuchi constituency, BJP’s Baren Chandra Barman was leading with a margin of 5,402 votes against TMC leader Partha Pratim Ray, the Election Commission data showed.

During the fourth phase of the elections on April 10, four people were killed when central security force personnel opened fire at a polling booth in Sitalkuchi in Cooch Behar district, after some locals allegedly clashed with them. Another person was shot dead that day outside a polling booth in the same district by unidentified men. The BJP and the TMC had accused each other of being responsible for the incident.

Due to the intensifying Covid-19 situation in the country, the Election Commission of India has prohibited the entry of polling agents into the counting centres without a negative Covid-19 test. Entry would also be allowed if the agents were fully vaccinated. The poll panel has also taken other measures to check the spread of the infection.

Follow live updates on the election results in all the states here