Voters in India's Assam and West Bengal cast their ballots yesterday in elections that will indicate how Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's support is holding up after a year of the coronavirus pandemic and months of protests against his farm reforms. 

Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah campaigned energetically for their Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in West Bengal, encouraging defections from the Trinamool Congress (TMC) party, whose firebrand leader Mamata Banerjee has been chief minister since 2011.

Victory in the eastern region of 90 million would be a major achievement for Modi's BJP as it looks to expand further its power base beyond its Hindi-speaking northern heartlands.

In a state where thousands have died since the 1960s, fresh incidents of violence were reported yesterday with police saying a mob threw bombs at one polling station, seriously injuring an officer.

The president of the BJP in the state, Dilip Ghosh, said one of their supporters was killed by members of the region's ruling Trinamool Congress party in the early hours.

Assailants also attacked the vehicles of at least two election candidates, police said.

In this phase, in West Bengal, more than 73 lakh voters will decide the fate of 191 candidates across 30 assembly segments -- nine in Purulia, four in Bankura, four in Jhargram, six in Paschim Medinipur, and seven in Purba Medinipur, reported our New Delhi Correspondent.

Voting in West Bengal takes place in eight phases, ending on April 29, and the votes will be counted on May 2.

The first phase of the election in West Bengal has registered a voter turnout of nearly 80 percent, Reuters reported citing election officials.

Politicians on the campaign trail often showed scant regard for social distancing, but as voters queued patiently at polling centres, security personnel and election workers handed out masks, hand sanitisers and gloves.

Modi was re-elected for a second five-year term in 2019, and his BJP is pushing to extend its influence beyond the 12 out of 28 states where it rules alone, and several others where it is part of a ruling alliance - not least because this would help it to control the upper house of the federal parliament.

It has never won power in West Bengal, and to do well in the state would send a formidable national signal.

"This election in Bengal is important because the BJP for the first time has emerged as a major contender," said Amal Mukhopadhyay, a former professor of political science at Kolkata's Presidency College.

In Assam, the BJP leads an alliance and is hopeful of retaining power against a strong coalition of Congress and smaller regional parties.

The state, home to 32 million people, is polarised along ethnic and religious lines, with immigration from neighbouring Bangladesh one of the biggest campaign issues.

A "citizenship list" in Assam state in 2019 left off almost two million people unable to prove they were Indian, many of them Muslims, a process many fear the BJP wants to roll out nationwide.

Voter turnout was reported over 76 percent. Assam's final phase of voting is on April 6 and results are expected on May 2.