Voting for the second phase of the union parishad polls is underway in Bangladesh, with over 41,000 candidates in the fray for different posts.

Polling began in 835 of 848 UPs at 8am on Thursday and will continue till 4pm.

A total of 81 chairman candidates have already been elected unopposed. Similarly, all contestants -- for chairman and member posts, and reserved seats -- in five UPs were elected uncontested.

Read: 2 hacked dead, 10 hurt in Meherpur pre-polls violence

Though the Election Commission had earlier announced the second phase poll schedule for 848 UPs, it postponed election in seven UPs and cancelled polling in one.

More than 41,000 candidates, including 3,310 contenders for the post of chairman, are contesting in the countrywide second phase UP election.

Some 28,747 candidates are contesting for the member posts and 9,161 women for the reserved seats in the UPs.

But 203 member candidates and 73 women candidates for reserved seats were elected unopposed in this phase.

There are nearly 16.6 million voters -- 8,405,831 men, 8,189,379 women and 16 transgender (Hijra) -- under 8,492 polling stations in these UPs.

Read: 4th phase elections to 840 UPs to be held Dec 23

About the recent election violence, Chief Election Commissioner KM Nurul Huda on Wednesday said that "it is not possible to prevent such incidents by only deploying policemen in every locality".

"Tolerance among all people concerned with the election is the only way to check such incidents," he had said.