Thiruvananthapuram, April 9 Polling in all 140 Assembly constituencies in Kerala began at 7 am on Thursday.
Voting commenced after mock polling was completed.
People started arriving early in the morning at the 30,495 polling stations across the state to avoid the hot weather, which was expected to worsen as the day progressed.
Congress senior and Leader of Opposition in the state assembly, V D Satheesan, arrived early for voting with his wife and daughter at their polling booth in the Paravoor constituency.
Similarly, BJP's candidate for the Vattiyoorkavu Assembly constituency, R Sreelekha, and Union Minister of State for Petroleum, Natural Gas and Tourism, Suresh Gopi, also arrived early for voting.
Polling was conducted under tight security arrangements, including the deployment of over 76,000 security personnel and live monitoring of the election process by an extensive webcasting system.
Around 2.71 crore voters will decide the fate of the 883 candidates contesting from the 140 Assembly constituencies in the state.
According to the Election Commission (EC), the electorate comprises 1.32 crore men, 1.39 crore women, and 273 transgender persons, along with over 2.42 lakh overseas voters.
To handle this large-scale electoral exercise, the EC has deployed 1.42 lakh trained personnel.
The voters will also decide whether the LDF should secure a consecutive third term, or whether the UDF or NDA present viable alternatives.
The poll outcome will also indicate whether the state is moving away from the traditional pattern of governance, which alternates between the LDF and the UDF, as the BJP has positioned itself as a viable alternative to the CPI (M) and Congress-led blocs.
The election campaign, which lasted nearly a month, witnessed intense political exchanges and high-decibel rhetoric, with all three fronts engaging in sharp attacks and counter-attacks.