Of the total 294 constituencies the second phase would involve 66 in Howrah, Hooghly, East Midnapore and Murshidabad districts where 348 candidates, including 28 women, are in the battlefield.

The first phase on April 17 saw balloting in 45 constituencies covering West Midnapore, Bankura and Purulia districts. Although these were known Maoist strongholds, there was no violence and the entire exercise took place peacefully.

Among the four districts having polling Saturday, Hooghly has 19 seats followed by 16 each in Howrah and East Midnapore and 15 in Nadia. The total number of voters in the four districts is 11.3 million. Shibpur in Howrah is the largest constituency with 269,646 voters.

A total of 122,99 polling stations have been set up in the four districts.

The total electorate in West Bengal is 48.9 million. The five-phase elections end May 8.

While Maoist violence and underdevelopment were the overriding concerns in the first phase, the areas in the second round are beset by industrial sickness, law and order problems, shoddy civic amenities, Bangladeshi infiltration and erosion of the Ganges river.

Howarh and Hooghly have been facing industrial sickness for decades, leading to the closure of hundreds of factories. In Howrah, which is also Kolkata's twin city, civic amenities are poor.

As everywhere in West Bengal, the main battle will be between the Left Front led by the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) and the Trinamool Congress of Mamata Banerjee.

Ambika Banerjee, the Trinamool candidate who has won from Howrah Central five times, alleged that the Left had treated the district shabbily. But of late Howrah has been in the limelight with upcoming projects like a food processing park, an IT hub and a motorbike factory by the Indonesian giant Salem besides a modern township by the same group.

Hooghly district, adjoining Howrah, too faces similar industrial sickness. In Nadia district, illegal migration of Bangladeshis is a major problem and an election issue.

Murshidabad on the other hand is wilting under severe erosion of the banks of the Ganges. The river has devoured human settlements, rendering people homeless.

Some of the prominent contenders in the second phase are CPI-M's Fire Services Minister Pratim Chatterjee (Tarakeshwar in Hooghly) and Animal Resource Development Minister Anisur Rahman (Domkol in Murshidabad) besides Atish Sinha (Congress, Kandhi, Murshidabad) and five-time winner from Howrah Central Ambika Roy (Trinamool).

Putting up a brave face against exit poll predictions that the Trinamool would get barely three of the 45 seats in the first phase, Mamata Banerjee campaigned hard for the second phase.

"We will do better this time. We only want a free and fair election," she said at an election meeting at Nadia.

Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharya hit the campaign trail in Nadia Wednesday and attacked both the Congress and the Trinamool Congress with virulence.

Hoping that there would be huge turnouts in the second phase, he called the Congress "the party of the rich" and accused the Trinamool of aligning with the Hindu rightwing.