West Bengal has delivered one of its highest electoral participation rates, with polling across the 2026 Assembly election touching 92.9% after two phases marked by an intense dispute over voter-roll deletions, strong women’s participation and an unusual surge in Kolkata’s traditionally low-turnout constituencies.The second and final phase on Wednesday covered 142 constituencies, taking place after the first phase on April 23 across 152 seats. Polling figures available late on April 29 placed second-phase turnout at 92.59%, while the first phase stood at 93.19%. The aggregate figure pushed the state well above its earlier Assembly election turnout benchmarks and turned voter participation itself into a central political story before counting on May 4.
Women led the turnout surge. Female voter participation across both phases stood at 93.24%, higher than the male turnout of 91.74%. The pattern held in both rounds: women recorded 94.10% turnout in the first phase against 92.34% for men, and 92.28% in the second phase against 91.07% for men. The gender gap is politically significant in a state where welfare transfers, safety, household inflation, employment and identity questions have shaped campaign messaging by the Trinamool Congress, Bharatiya Janata Party, Left parties and Congress.
Large-scale changes to the electoral roll under the special intensive revision framed much of the campaign and appeared to sharpen voter mobilisation. Around nine million names were removed during the revision process that began in 2025, while supplementary additions later lifted the final electorate to about 68.25 million. The deletions included names classified as dead, shifted, duplicate or otherwise ineligible, but the process also triggered sharp political allegations over exclusion, citizenship scrutiny and targeted disenfranchisement.
Tribunal interventions added another layer to the controversy. More than 1,600 voters were cleared to vote across the two phases after review, including 1,468 before the second phase, while a small number of deletions were confirmed. The scale of the revision created anxiety across districts, particularly among marginal voters, migrant households and communities vulnerable to documentation disputes. That anxiety may have contributed to the exceptional turnout, as voters appeared determined to assert their presence on the rolls.
Kolkata supplied one of the sharpest departures from past behaviour. The city, which had often lagged behind rural and semi-urban Bengal in turnout, crossed 88% in the second phase. Several constituencies in and around the capital recorded polling levels rarely seen in earlier Assembly contests. The 2021 Assembly election had left Kolkata among the weakest turnout zones, with participation close to 60% in several urban pockets. This time, political parties treated the city’s surge as evidence that the SIR dispute, anti-incumbency, welfare politics and neighbourhood-level mobilisation had combined to pull voters out in unusual numbers.
The second phase covered Kolkata, Howrah, Hooghly, Nadia, North 24 Parganas, South 24 Parganas and Purba Bardhaman, a belt central to the Trinamool Congress’s organisational strength and the BJP’s bid to consolidate gains made since 2019. South 24 Parganas and Purba Bardhaman crossed 93%, while North 24 Parganas and Nadia also recorded heavy participation. These districts include several seats where citizenship, border migration, women’s welfare schemes, employment and local governance were contested intensely.
Polling was largely orderly, though complaints of irregularities, local clashes and alleged EVM tampering reached election authorities. Allegations involving taped buttons on voting machines in parts of South 24 Parganas prompted warnings that repolling could be ordered where verification supported the complaints. Isolated violence was reported from pockets of Howrah and Hooghly, but the scale of disruption did not derail the overall polling process.
For the ruling Trinamool Congress, high women’s turnout offers a possible advantage because its campaign leaned heavily on welfare schemes aimed at women, household support and social protection. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s party also framed the SIR exercise as a threat to vulnerable voters, seeking to turn anxiety over deletion into mobilisation.
For the BJP, the same turnout may reflect a demand for change after 15 years of Trinamool rule. Suvendu Adhikari and other party leaders focused on governance, corruption allegations, employment, law and order, border security and what they described as appeasement politics. The party also presented voter-roll revision as a clean-up exercise needed to protect electoral integrity.