Established in 1951, the constituency has participated in 18 Assembly elections so far, including a by-election in 2014. After a mixed verdict in the initial two decades, Galsi turned into a Left Front citadel, holding it firmly for over four decades before the Trinamool Congress emerged to make it its own stronghold, with the BJP now challenging its dominance.
It was a twin-seat constituency in the first two elections of 1951 and 1957, with the Congress party winning both seats in 1951, while an Independent and the Marxist Forward Bloc shared the two seats in 1957. The Left Front won this seat 10 times in a row, including seven victories of the Forward Bloc and three wins of the CPI(M). An Independent politician, Phakir Chandra Roy, and the Trinamool Congress have registered victories thrice each, while the Congress party held the seat twice, including both seats of 1951 and then in 1962.
Sunil Kumar Mandal of the Forward Bloc won the seat in 2011, defeating Joydeb Saha of the Trinamool Congress by 10,854 votes. Mandal later joined the Trinamool Congress, leading to the 2014 by-election. With Mandal by its side, the Trinamool Congress opened its account here as its nominee Gour Chandra Mondal prevailed over Nandalal Pondit of the Forward Bloc by 8,853 votes. Sunil Kumar Mandal was rewarded by the Trinamool Congress with a nomination for the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, which he won. The by-election victory opened the gate for the Trinamool Congress to spread its wings as it won the next two elections with two different candidates. In 2016, Alok Kumar Majhi beat Nandalal Pondit by 10,771 votes, and in 2021, Nepal Ghorui defeated the BJPтАЩs Bikas Biswas by 19,262 votes.
Voting trends during the Lok Sabha elections in the Galsi Assembly segment reflect shifting loyalties and restlessness among its voters. In 2009, the CPI(M) led the Congress party by 29,888 votes. Trinamool Congress marked its emergence in Galsi in 2014 as it led CPI(M) by a narrow margin of 1,924 votes. In 2019, the BJP emerged from the margins to establish a lead of 9,621 votes over Trinamool Congress, which snatched the lead from the BJP by 20,754 votes in 2024.
The Galsi Assembly constituency had 231,873 electors in the Draft Electoral Roll released on December 16 2025, by the Chief Electoral Officer of West Bengal, marking a decline of 31,912 votes, compared to 263,785 registered voters it had in 2024. Previously, it witnessed steady growth and stood at 256,642 in 2021, 249,479 in 2019, 236,847 in 2016, and 204,589 in 2011.
The Scheduled Castes are the most dominant in this reserved seat with 34.16 per cent of the voters, while the Scheduled Tribes account for 6.27 per cent and Muslims approximately 23 per cent of the electorate. It is a predominantly rural seat with 80.63 per cent of voters living in villages compared to 19.37 per cent in urban pockets. The voter turnout has remained robust, standing at 89.02 per cent in 2011, 86.56 per cent in 2016, 84.76 per cent in 2019, and 86.72 per cent in 2021.
Galsi lies in the flat alluvial plains of Purba Bardhaman district, typical of the Damodar river basin, with fertile soil supporting paddy cultivation as the mainstay of the economy alongside some vegetable farming and small-scale trade. The Damodar River flows nearby, influencing the terrain with occasional flooding and irrigation benefits. Infrastructure includes National Highway 19 passing close by, providing strong road connectivity, while Galsi railway station on the Bardhaman-Asansol line offers rail links. Durgapur is about 45 km away, Asansol around 70 km, Bardhaman, the district headquarters, is roughly 40 km, and Kolkata, the state capital, is approximately 140 km. In neighbouring districts, Bolpur in Birbhum is about 60 km away, and the Jharkhand border lies farther west beyond Asansol.
If the post-SIR draft roll remains more or less unchanged when the final electoral roll is published, it will have a major impact on the outcome in Galsi constituency, as the number of names deleted is far bigger than the Trinamool CongressтАЩs margins over the BJP in the 2021 and 2024 polls. What further adds a layer of intrigue is the assumption that the SIR must have hit the Muslim community more than others. That would mean fewer committed voters for the Trinamool Congress. This opens up the 2026 Assembly elections in Galsi. The Left Front-Congress alliance was tottering on the margins by polling single-digit votes and is unlikely to have any major impact on the outcome, other than adding colours to the election. The stage is thus set for a direct and fierce battle between the Trinamool Congress and the BJP for the Galsi constituency.
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(Ajay Jha)
