All arrangements are in place to conduct free and fair elections in 14 Lok Sabha constituencies going to polls on Saturday in the sixth phase in Uttar Pradesh. Elaborate security is in place with around two lakh security personnel, including over 230 companies of Central forces, deployed on election duty for this phase.
The Elections Commission of India will hold the by-election to Gansadi assembly constituency in Balrampur district along with the polls in 14 Lok Sabha constituencies.
The 14 constituencies going to polls on Saturday in the sixth phase include Sultanpur, Pratapgarh, Phulpur, Allahabad, Ambedkar Nagar, Shravasti, Domariyaganj, Basti, Sant Kabir Nagar, Lalganj, Azamgarh, Jaunpur, Machhlishahr and Bhadohi.
Uttar Pradesh’s Chief Electoral Officer Navdeep Rinwa said here on Friday that elaborate arrangements were in place to conduct free and fair polls. He said polling parties had already started reaching their polling booths.
He said over 2.70 crore voters – over 1.43 crore male and 1.27 crore female voters and 1,256 third gender voters – were expected to exercise their franchise in the sixth phase of polling. Sant Kabir Nagar has the highest number of voters and Allahabad the lowest.
To keep vigil on the voting, the ECI has deployed three special observers, 14 general observers, eight police observers and 18 expenditure observers. Besides, 2,192 sector magistrates, 282 zonal magistrates, 24 static magistrates and 2,833 micro observers have also been deployed.
Live webcasting has been arranged at more than 50 per cent of polling places (14,480 polling places) and it will be supervised at three levels – district election officer, chief electoral officer, and the Election Commission of India. Apart from the above, arrangements for videography have also been made at 5,057 polling places.
There are 162 candidates in the fray – 146 male and 16 female candidates –in the sixth phase elections.
In the sixth phase election, maximum 26 candidates are contesting from Pratapgarh Lok Sabha constituency and lowest six candidates in Domariyaganj. For the sixth phase polling, 17,113 polling stations have been set up. The number of polling booths is 28,171 of which 3,978 booths have been identified as critical.
In Sultanpur, the electoral contest features Maneka Gandhi from the Bharatiya Janata Party, Bhim Nishad representing the Samajwadi Party and Udiraj Verma. Pratapgarh witnesses a contest between Sangam Lal Gupta of the BJP and SP Singh Patel from the SP.
Allahabad showcases a battle between Neeraj Tripathi of the BJP and Ujjwal Reoti Raman Singh of the Congress. Ambedkar Nagar presents a contest between Ritesh Pandey of the BJP and sitting SP MLA Lalji Verma. Domariyaganj sees a contest between Jagdambika Pal representing the BJP and Khwaja Shamsuddin from the Bahujan Samaj Party.
In the Basti Lok Sabha constituency, Harish Dwivedi (BJP) is locked in a direct contest with Ram Prasad Chaudhary of the SP. In Lalganj, Neelam Sonkar from the BJP and Daroga Saroj representing the SP are the main contenders.
Azamgarh sets the stage for a fierce contest between Dinesh Lal Yadav ‘Nirahua’ of the BJP and Dharmendra Yadav from the SP. In Jaunpur, Kripashankar Singh of the BJP is locked in a triangular contest with Babu Singh Kushwaha of the SP and Shyam Singh Yadav of BSP. In Bhadohi, Vinod Kumar Bind from the BJP is facing Lalitesh Pati Tripathi of the Mamta Banarjee-led Trinamool Congress.
These electoral matchups showcase the diverse political landscape and the fervour of democracy in Uttar Pradesh.
