West Bengal

Will Didi succeed in her quest to be a king maker in the government formation? Her target of 30+ seats was projected by many opinion polls to be very feasible. She is making every effort in the state to ensure the Left bastions are smothered, and the few BJP and Congress seats are snatched back.  The state intelligence branch of West Bengal Police has predicted only 18-22 seats for the Trinamool while BJP could win 4. This could be called an underestimation by many, but they were accurate in the 2011 assembly when they predicted 180-185 seats for TMC and they ended up winning 184.

The strongest undercurrent in the state is the use of violence by Trinamool party workers to keep the Left supporters away from the booths. Another allegation is the booth rigging across many rural areas not monitored by the CRPF. Whether such dirty tactics along with her image in the state will ensure an even stronger vote share in favor of Trinamool remains to be seen. Both Trinamool and BJP have fielded many stars to add more flavor to the polls this year. Whether these stars succeed is another highlight of the elections in WB.

Some of the interesting contests in the state will be in the following constituencies-

• Darjeeling - One of the most interesting contests in the state as BJP's S.S. Ahluwalia is taking on Indian soccer star Bhaichung Bhutia fielded by Trinamool in a strategic move to wrest this seat from BJP which won this seat comfortably in 2009 fielding Jaswant Singh. The BJP candidate is supported by Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM) who are against Bhutia and Trinamool. The demand for Gorkhaland though hasn't been backed strongly by the BJP in their manifesto and campaigns, which could cause a setback.
• Bankura - Basudeb Acharya has held this seat since 1980 and should ideally not lose to Moon Moon Sen of Trinamool Congress for whom her daughters Riya and Raima have campaigned enthusiastically to add the glamor quotient. But Moon Moon has been gaining a lot of ground and could cause a major upset here
• Serampore - One of the most watched constituencies of the state, the craze for Bappi da is expected to help BJP wrest this seat from Trinamool's Kalyan Banerjee, but it will not be easy
• Ghatal - Dev, a young and popular Bengali film star is contesting on a Trinamool ticket to wrest this seat from the Left. Even the CPM leaders have conceded defeat as sitting MP, CPI's veteran leader Gurudas Dasgupta retired from politics before the elections. CPI's Santosh Rana is seen as no match to Dev
• Asansol - Always a CPM stronghold this time it is witnessing a fierce battle from BJP's singer-turned politician Babul Supriyo who has gained a lot of ground. But TMC is desperate to ensure BJP doesn't gain much vote share
• Bongaon - The Matua caste will play the decisive role here. Both Trinamool and BJP have fielded candidates who have a strong base in that community and are expected to be the main contestants here. BJP's K.D.Biswas is the secretary of the Matua Mahasangh and is considered quite influential. Since Bongaon is also close to the Bangladesh border, Modi's speech about treating infiltration more strictly is also expected to play a role
• Barasat - Interesting contest here as magician P.C.Sorcar junior is fielded by BJP to take on the might of Trinamool's sitting MP Dr. Kakali Ghoshdostidar. Whether he will do some magic remains to be seen. Dr. Mortoza Hossain from AIFB is the other candidate in the fray
• Jangipur - Abhijit Mukherjee, son of Pranab Mukherjee is the sitting MP here and is expected to face a tough challenge from strong muslim leaders fielded by other parties. Though he is confident of winning, Trinamool's Nurul Islam and CPM's Muzzafar Hossain are potential threats. Nurul had won in 2009 from Basirhat and is contesting from here in a strategic move by Mamata
• Howrah - It should be a comfortable win for ex-football captain Prasun Banerjee from Trinamool, who won here in a 2013 bypoll defeating Sridip Bhattacharya. But the police intelligence report has predicted a loss for him.
• Dum Dum - It is a triangular contest here between three strong candidates. Sitting MP Saugata Roy of Trinamool will find it tough to retain this seat against Tapan Sikdar of BJP, who has won here twice in the 90s and CPM's Asim Dasgupta who was the state's finance minister in its 20-year rule
• Jadavpur - It is from this constituency that a young Mamata Banerjee defeated Somnath Chaterjee in 1984. Though this constituency has sprung surprises often, it seems to be advantage AITC here for a second term as the rural population is in support of Mamata. Also of note is that Trinamool candidate Sugata Bose is a Harvard history professor and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose's grandnephew
• Joynagar - It is unclear who has the edge here, as sitting MP Tarun Mandal who won as an Independent in 2009 is contesting on a SUCI ticket this year, while Subhas Naskar will look to wrest back this seat for RSP which had held this seat from 1980 to 2004. Trinamool has been accused of rigging and violence in this constituency as well, and this could also very well affect the outcome
• Kolkata Uttar - It is expected to be a close contest here between 4 candidates - Trinamool sitting MP Sudip Bandyopadhyay, Congress veteran Somen Mitra BJP's state president Rahul Sinha and CPM's KMC Opposition leader Rupa Bagchi. But Trinamool has the edge as it controls all seven assembly segments and 38 of the 60 KMC wards
• Purulia - Will be a triangular contest between AIFB's sitting MP Narahari Mahato, Trinamool's Mriganka Mahato and Congress's Nepal Mahata. Congress's candidate is seen as a good challenger because of his local support and his role in bringing steel giant Jindal to this constituency. It will be tough for him to battle Congress's anti-incumbency

My constituency-wise predictions are as follows-

No	Constituency	Predicted Winner	Party	Other Top 2 Candidate	Party
1	ALIPURDUARS	Monohar Tirkey	RSP	Dasharath Tirkey	AITC
2	ARAMBAGH	Saktimohan Malik	CPM	Madhusudan Bag	BJP
3	ASANSOL	Babul Supriyo	BJP	Bansa Gopal Choudhury	CPM
4	BAHARAMPUR	Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury	INC	Pramothes Mukherjee	RSP
5	BALURGHAT	Bimalendu Sarkar	RSP	Biswapriya Roy Choudhury	BJP
6	BANGAON	Kapil Krishna Thakur	AITC	K.D.Biswas	BJP
7	BANKURA	Basudeb Acharia	CPM	Moon Moon Sen	AITC
8	BARASAT	Dr. Kakali Ghoshdostidar	AITC	P.C.Sorcar Junior	BJP
9	BARDHAMAN PURBA	Sunil Kumar Mondal	AITC	Iswar Chandra Das	CPM
10	BARDHAMAN DURGAPUR	Dr. Mamtaz Sanghamita	AITC	Sk. Saidul Haque	CPM
11	BARRACKPUR	Dinesh Trivedi	AITC	Subhashini Ali	CPM
12	BASIRHAT	Idris Ali	AITC	Nurul Huda	CPI
13	BIRBHUM	Satabdi Roy	AITC	Joy Banerjee	BJP
14	BISHNUPUR	Susmita Bauri	CPM	Saumitra Khan	AITC
15	BOLPUR	Ramchandra Dome	CPM	Anupam Hazra	AITC
16	COOCHBEHAR	Renuka Sinha	AITC	Dipak Kumar Roy	AIFB
17	DARJEELING	S.S. Ahluwalia	BJP	Bhaichung Bhutia	AITC
18	DIAMOND HARBOUR	Abhishek Banerjee	AITC	Dr. Abul Hasnat	CPM
19	DUM DUM	Tapan Sikdar	BJP	Saugata Roy	AITC
20	GHATAL	Adhikari Deepak (Dev)	AITC	Santosh Rana	CPI
21	HOOGHLY	Dr. Ratna De (Nag)	AITC	Dr. Chandan Mitra	BJP
22	HOWRAH	Prasun Banerjee	AITC	Sridip Bhattacharya	CPM
23	JADAVPUR	Sugata Bose	AITC	Sujan Chakraborty	CPM
24	JALPAIGURI	Mahendra Kumar Roy	CPM	Satyalal Sarkar	BJP
25	JANGIPUR	Sk Nurul Islam	AITC	Abhijeet Mukherjee	INC
26	JAYNAGAR	Pratima Mondal	AITC	Subhas Naskar	RSP
27	JHARGRAM	Dr. Pulin Bihari Baske	CPM	Uma Saren	AITC
28	KANTHI	Adhikari Sisir Kumar	AITC	Sinha Tapas	CPM
29	KOLKATA DAKHSIN	Subrata Bakshi	AITC	Nandini Mukherjee	CPM
30	KOLKATA UTTAR	Sudip Bandyopadhyay	AITC	Rahul (Biswajit) Sinha	BJP
31	KRISHNANAGAR	Satya Brata Mookherjee	BJP	Tapas Paul	AITC
32	MALDAHA DAKSHIN	Abu Hasem Khan Chowdhury	INC	Md Moazzem Hossain	AITC
33	MALDAHA UTTAR	Smt. Mausam Noor	INC	Soumitra Roy	AITC
34	MATHURAPUR	Choudhury Mohan Jatua	AITC	Rinku Naskar	CPM
35	MEDINIPUR	Prabodh Panda	CPI	Sandhya Roy	AITC
36	MURSHIDABAD	Badarudzza Khan	CPM	Abdul Mannan Hossain	INC
37	PURULIA	Nepal Mahata	INC	Narahari Mahato	AIFB
38	RAIGANJ	Smt. Deepa Dasmunshi	INC	Mohammed Salim	CPM
39	RANAGHAT	Tapas Mandal	AITC	Archana Biswas	CPM
40	SERAMPORE	Bappi Lahiri	BJP	Kalyan Banerjee	AITC
41	TAMLUK	Adhikari Suvendu	AITC	Badsha Alam	BJP
42	ULUBERIA	Sultan Ahmed	AITC	Sabir Uddin Molla	CPM

The seats tally prediction is as follows

Party	Seats
AITC	22
BJP	5
CPI	1
CPM	7
INC	5
RSP	2