Renowned Malayalam actor Mohanlal also voted early in the day.

Sivankutty is the Left Democratic Front (LDF) candidate from the Nemom Assembly constituency, which is witnessing a three-way contest among the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Congress, and Communist Party of India (Marxist). He faces a significant challenge from Keralam BJP chief Rajeev Chandrasekhar, while the United Democratic Front (UDF) has nominated KS Sabarinadhan, son of former Congress leader and Keralam Minister G Karthikeyan.

In the 2016 elections, Sivankutty lost the Nemom seat to BJP veteran O Rajagopal, marking the party’s first Assembly victory in the state. However, Sivankutty regained the seat in the 2021 elections.

Polling began at 7 am on Thursday for critical electoral battles in Assam, Keralam, and the Union Territory of Puducherry, with the Election Commission ensuring arrangements for free, fair, and smooth voting. Voters queued outside polling stations to participate in the single-phase assembly elections, covering 126 seats in Assam, 140 in Keralam, and 30 in Puducherry.

Future polling dates include Tamil Nadu on April 23 and West Bengal on April 23 and 29, with vote counting scheduled for May 4.

In Keralam, more than 26 million electors will decide the fate of 883 candidates across 140 constituencies. The total registered voters number 26,953,644, including 13,827,319 women and 13,126,048 men. Officials reported 277 voters registered under the ‘third gender’ category.

Among the electorate, approximately 424,518 voters are aged 18-19, and 204,608 are 85 years and older. To ensure safe and secure polling, 30,471 polling stations have been established, including 119 logistics and voter machine distribution centres and 41 vote counting centres.

Keralam Chief Electoral Officer Rathan U Kelkar stated on Tuesday that 146,000 trained polling personnel had been deployed to polling stations. “As part of the arrangements for Kerala Assembly elections, we have the total electorate of 2.71 crores, and the service voters are 53,984. We will be counting the votes in 140 strong rooms and 43 locations. We have 1.46 lakh polling personnel who have been trained and will be dispatched to all the polling stations,” he said.

Kelkar added, “We have FIRs against 180 people in terms of election-related activities, and more than 1,200 police teams are very actively working in the field. We are ensuring that all the new initiatives by the Election Commission are implemented properly.”

The election is widely viewed as a contest between the ruling LDF and opposition UDF, with the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) increasing its vote share. The LDF currently holds 99 seats in the assembly and aims for a third consecutive term, relying on its performance and welfare schemes. The coalition set a record in 2021 by retaining power in the southern state, which has traditionally seen alternating governance between the CPI(M)-led and Congress-led coalitions.