New Delhi, Feb 26 (PTI) The Left parties on Friday alleged that the election commission had failed to provide credible justification for conducting a eight phase election in West Bengal and questioned the motive behind it.

Voting for five assembly elections will begin on March 27, with West Bengal having the maximum eight phases continuing till April 29, while counting of votes for the four states and one union territory will be done on May 2, the Election Commission said on Friday.

The Assam assembly polls will be conducted in three phases on March 27, April 1 and April 6, while polling for the Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry assembly elections will take place in a single phase on April 6.

Elections for the West Bengal assembly will be held in eight phases, up from seven last time, beginning with polling for 30 seats on March 27, Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora said while announcing the poll schedule.

CPI (M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury urged the poll panel to explain the reason for stretching stretching the Bengal polls to almost a month while in other states -- Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Pudducherry -- it can be wrapped in a single day and in Assam in three phases.

“These elections are going to be crucial. The overall objective today is to keep BJP at bay, which is making all unscrupulous attempts in order to capture power in these states. In Bengal, the basic alternative that is emerging, on the strength of the people's struggles in the past few months, braving the repression of TMC government is the secular democratic alliance of Left-Congress,” he said.

Yechury said to defeat the BJP in Bengal, it is necessary to defeat the incumbent TMC government, which he alleged facilitated the BJP's entry into the state. “The anti-incumbency against the TMC government is feeding the BJP,” he said.

In Kerala, Yechury said the LDF is poised to return to power, which is unprecedented in the state where the Congress-led UDF and the Left government alternate between each other.

CPI General Secretary D Raja also said the Election Commission should have provided "convincing reasons for it”. CPI (ML) General Secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya in a tweet said, “Five-day test match in Chennai becomes a two-day affair in Ahmedabad. One-day election in Tamil Nadu gets stretched over eight phases in West Bengal. Can any of you explain this numbers game?”

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)