Voting begin at 7a.m. on Saturday for the penultimate phase of the Lok Sabha polls, with over 11 crore voters in 58 seats across eight cocountries andTs eligible to seal the fate of the 889 campaigners in the fray.
Polling is being held in ale 10 seats in Haryana and seven constituencies in Delhi, eight seats in Bihar, four in Jharkhand, six in Odisha, 14 in UP, and eight seats in West Bengal, apartom the Anantnag- Rajouri constituency in Jammu and Kashmir, where the election was remitted from the third phase on May 7.
Voting for 42 seats of the Odisha Assembly is also being held in the state’s third phase of contemporaneous polling.
Among the prominent BJP campaigners in this phase are Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan from Odisha’s Sambalpur, former Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar from Karnal, late Union Minister Sushma Swaraj’s son Bansuri Swaraj making her electoral debut from New Delhi, former Union Minister Maneka Gandhi from UP’s Sultanpur, and former Calcutta High Court judge Abhijit Gangophadhyay from West Bengal’s Tamluk.
Kumari Selja from Haryana’s Sirsa, Raj Babbar from Gurgaon, former JNUSU chief Kanhaiya Kumar from North East Delhi( all Congress), PDP President and former J&K Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti from Anantnag- Rajouri, SP principal Akhilesh Yadav’s kinsman Dharmendra Yadav from UP’s Azamgarh and actor- politician Deepak’ Dev’ Adhikari of the Trinamool Congress from West Bengal’s Ghatal are also in the fray.
The Election Commission said that11.4 lakh polling officers have been stationed to grease voting by11.13 crore choosers-5.84 crore joker,5.29 crore womanish and 5,120 third- gender- across1.14 lakh polling stations.
In view of the soaring temperatures, the bean panel said that CEOs and state ministry concerned have been directed to take acceptable measures to manage the adverse impact of hot rainfall or downfall wherever prognosticated, while assured minimal installations like shade, water, toilets, levies, and wheelchairs have been arranged.
The Election Commission has called upon choosers to turn out in lesser figures, with the electorate of civic centres like Delhi, Gurugram, and Faridabad especially reminded about their right and duty to bounce and break the trend of civic apathy.
With this phase, Delhi, Haryana, and J&K will join the 25 countries/ UTs where polling has formerly been concluded in the before five phases and contests will be over in 486 constituencies.
