Slogans ranging from sympathisers of Pakistan to changing the Constitution and appointing Amit Shah as a next Prime Minister to assault on Swati Maliwal to Adityanath vs Arvind Kejriwal dominated in the sixth phase of polling as campaigning ended on Thursday for May 25 polls for 58 Lok Sabha seats spread in six States and Union Territories.
What makes this phase particularly interesting is that all seven seats in Delhi and all the 10 seats in Haryana will go to polls. Notably, States and UTs including Delhi, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Odisha are likely to be voting under the hottest conditions ever for a Lok Sabha polls as temperatures may touch 46 degrees Celsius on that day which means heatwave to severe heatwave conditions are possible.
A total of 889 candidates will be in the fray in the 58 Lok Sabha seats.
Among the key contestants are Dharmendra Pradhan (BJP) from Sambalpur (Odisha), Manoj Tiwari (BJP) and Kanhaiya Kumar (Congress) from North East Delhi, Bansuri Swaraj from New Delhi Maneka Gandhi (BJP) from Sultanpur (Uttar Pradesh), Mehbooba Mufti (PDP) from Anantnag-Rajouri (Jammu & Kashmir), Abhijit Gangopadhyay (BJP) from Tamluk (West Bengal), and BJP's Manohar Lal Khattar (Karnal, Haryana), Naveen Jindal (Kurukshetra) Raj Babbar ( Gurugram) Dinesh Lal Yadav alias Nirahua ( Azamgarh) and Rao Inderjit Singh (Gururgram).
So far, polling has been completed in 428 constituencies across 25 States and Union Territories, with phase V witnessing a voter turnout of approximately 62.19 per cent. In the corresponding phase during the 2019 polls, a voter turnout of 64.16 per cent was recorded as 51 seats across seven states went to the polls.
The Congress did not win even one of these 58 seats in the 2019 elections. In contrast, the BJP won 40, securing a vote share of more than 40 per cent on 47 seats in the last elections. This clearly shows, Congress doesn't have any strongholds in this phase.
On the last day of campaigning, Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a rally in Punjab and Haryana.
He took a dig at the INDIA Bloc, saying the "cow hasn't given milk but the fight over ghee has started" as the alliance is "talking about having five PMs in five years".
Modi also asserted that till he is alive, no one can snatch the reservation for Dalits and tribals.
The day before, he referred to the Calcutta High Court's decision to strike down the OBC status granted to "77 classes" in West Bengal since 2010 to hit out at the INDIA Bloc, saying its "obsession with appeasement" has crossed every limit.
The contest in the national Capital has become interesting as it is a direct fight between the BJP and INDIA Bloc parties — the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) after the release of Arvind Kejriwal on an interim bail for electoral campaigning.
The Kejriwal-led AAP is contesting four seats, while the Congress has fielded candidates in three seats as per the seat-sharing agreement. The BJP, which won all seven seats of Delhi in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections, has dropped all except Manoj Tiwari.
The BJP's poll campaign in Delhi saw Modi addressing two rallies besides canvassing by Union Ministers Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari, Smriti Irani and Piyush Goyal and Chief Ministers of BJP-ruled States, including Yogi Adityanath (Uttar Pradesh), Pushkar Singh Dhami (Uttarakhand) and Pramod Sawant (Goa).
The INDIA Bloc is clearly counting on the sympathy wave following Kejriwal's arrest. The BJP's campaign, on the other hand, relies on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's development agenda while questioning the credentials of Kejriwal, the once anti-corruption crusader who is now named as accused in a money laundering case.
At the peak of campaigning in Odisha, BJP's Puri candidate Sambit Patra kicked up a row with his comment that "Lord Jagannath is a devotee of Modi". Patra later clarified that his remark was inadvertently made and expressed regret.
In Jammu and Kashmir, polling in four of the five parliamentary seats having ended peacefully, the focus has now shifted to the reshaped Anantnag-Rajouri constituency which witnessed four terror attacks in the last 30 days.
The constituency spread on either side of the mighty Pir Panjal was originally scheduled to go to polls on May 7 but it was deferred to May 25 due to adverse weather conditions on the request of several parties, including the BJP, Apni party and the DPAP. Mehbooba faces a tough challenge from National Conference candidate and influential Gujjar leader Mian Altaf and the Apni Party's Zafar Iqbal Khan Manhas, who has the BJP's backing.Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP) leader Mohamad Saleem Parray
In UP, Sultanpur which is a seat to watch, next door to Amethi, another Gandhi, Maneka Gandhi of the BJP, is locked in a keen contest with her Samajwadi Party rival. Mayawati-led BSP's party nominee Udraj Verma, who hails from OBC Kurmi caste, is causing trouble to the BJP as well as the SP candidates but Akhilesh Yadav-headed SP candidate Ram Bhual Nishad is at a greater loss.
Verma threatens to divide the OBC votes of the SP. Sultanpur bifurcated from Amethi in 2010. Varun Gandhi was its first MP while Maneka swapped seats with him in 2019 and is contesting for the second consecutive time.
Varun joined the campaigning for her mother on Thursday. The Lok Sabha seat of Azamgarh, a stronghold of the SP with a sizeable Muslim-Yadav electorate, is witnessing Dinesh Lal Yadav 'Nirahua' of the BJP taking on former Lok Sabha MP Dharmendra Yadav for the SP.
In Haryana, the BJP is contesting all 10 seats on its own. While the Congress is fighting on nine seats, the AAP is fighting on the lone seat of Kurukshetra. The high-pitched campaigning, which saw the presence of top leaders including Modi, BJP chief J P Nadda, Union Ministers Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari, Chief Ministers of BJP-ruled States, Congress leaders Rahul, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Kejriwal and BSP leader Mayawati. Haryana is witnessing a direct fight between the ruling BJP and opposition Congress on most seats. The key candidates are Manohar Lal Khattar from the Karnal seat whereas it has gone for industrialist Naveen Jindal to battle it out in Kurukshetra.
The Congress, on the other hand, has hedged its bets on Raj Babbar against Union Minister and sitting MP Rao Inderjit Singh in Gurugram. From Hisar, Power Minister Ranjit Singh Chautala, an Independent MLA who joined the BJP ahead of polls, is contesting against two members of the Chautala clan -- JJP's Naina Chautala and INLD's Sunaina Chautala.
