Royals, CMs’ sons, ex-Ministers among 961 in fray in 9 States
The voting for fourth phase of Lok Sabha (LS) elections for 71 seats in nine States on Monday would witness in the battle ring sons of Chief Ministers, royals, former Union Ministers, film celebrities as also a bitterly-found contest between fire-brand student leader Kanhaiya Kumar and BJP candidate and Union Minister Giriraj Singh.
The fate of 961 candidates will be decided by about 12.79 crore voters, including in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Mahrashtra, Mahdhya Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal. In Madhya Pradesh bypoll to Chhindwara Assembly constituency where Chief Minister Kamal Nath is in the fray will also be held simultaneously with LS poll on Monday. LS elections in MP will be held in four phases on April 29, and May 6, 12 and May 19, the last phase. In the first phase, six LS constituencies of Sidhi, Shahdol, Jabalpur, Mandla, Balaghat and Chhindwara will go to polls in Madhya Pradesh.
Chhindwara, the LS constituency held by Congress leader Kamal Nath would now see his son Nakul Nath seeking mandate from the seat, a pocket borough of the Nath family.
State BJP president Rakesh Singh and former Union Minister and BJP’s tribal face Faggan Singh Kulaste are contesting from Jabalpur and Mandla, respectively.
In Rajasthan, 13 of 25 seats will go to polls on Monday with 115 candidates in fray. Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot’s son, a member of erstwhile Jaipur royal family and two Union Ministers are among candidates whose fate will be decided in polling on 13 Lok Sabha seats in Rajasthan.
The constituencies are —Tonk-Sawaimadhopur, Ajmer, Pali, Jodhpur, Barmer, Jalore, Udaipur, Banswara, Chittorgarh, Rajsamand, Bhilwara, Kota and Jhalawar-Baran. Ghelot’s son Vaibhav is contesting from Jodhpur on the Congress ticket and is pitted against sitting MP and Union Minister of State Gajendra Singh Shekhawat.
The Jodhpur constituency, which has been represented by Gehlot for five times since 1980, has become a prestige issue for him who conducted more than 90 rallies, public meetings, roadshows in the constituency during the campaigning period which ended on Saturday evening.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah also held public meetings and roadshows in Jodhpur to ensure the victory of party candidate Shekhawat.
In Barmer seat, former External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh Manvendra is contesting election on Congress ticket against BJP’s Kailash Chaudhary.
Former BJP MLA and ex- Jaipur royal family member Diya Kumari is making debut in the Lok Sabha election as a BJP candidate from Rajsamand while Union Minister of State PP Chaudhary is in the fray from Pali. The Tonk-Sawaimadhopur seat will see contest between former Union Minister and Congress candidate Namonarain Meena and BJP MP Sukhbir Singh Jaunapuria.
Industrialist and Congress candidate Riju Jhunjhunwala and BJP’s Bhagirath Chaudhary will fight for Ajmer seat.
This seat in 2009 was won by Sachin Pilot, who is now the state Congress chief and Rajasthan’s deputy chief minister.
In Uttar Pradesh Senior Congress leader Salman Khurshid is locked in a three-way electoral contest from his traditional constituency of Farrukhabad where he is facing the challenge of overcoming the “Modi factor” and outsmarting the SP-BSP-RLD coalition in capturing the anti-BJP vote.
The opponents of Khurshid, a former Union Minister who has held portfolios of External Affairs, Law and Minorities, may not be political heavyweights, but BJP’s sitting MP Mukesh Rajput and BSP’s Manoj Agarwal are tough opponents on a seat which is not dominated by a single caste, religion or social group.
In Bihar, Begusarai is to witness very keen contest between Kanaihya Kumar and Giriraj Singh. A number of film artists, including Shabana Azmi and Javed Akhtar, have campaigned for Kumar. BJP has described Kumar as the part of ‘Tukde-Tukde gang’ as Kumar has described Singh as an “outsider” in Begusarai.
In West Bengal eight Lok Sabha constituencies would go to poll on Monday, which will decide the fate of 68 candidates in the fray. The eight seats -- Baharampur, Krishnagar, Ranaghat (SC), Burdwan East (SC), Burdwan-Durgapur, Asansol, Bolpur (SC) and Birbhum -- will see a four-cornered contest between the Trinamool Congress, the BJP, the Congress and the Left Front.
An electorate of 1,34,56,491 will decide the fate of 68 candidates in these eight constituencies, the Election Commission said. In Asansol, Union minister and BJP sitting MP Babul Supriyo will contest against TMC’s celebrity candidate Moon Moon Sen. The CPI(M) has nominated Gouranga Chatterjee and the Congress Biswarup Mondal for the seat. Another film celebrity candidate Satabdi Roy is the TMC name from the Birbhum seat against BJP’s Dudh Kumar Mondal. The Congress has nominated Imam Hossain and the CPI(M) named Rezaul Karim for the seat. The TMC has fielded Apurba Sarkar (David) against the Congress MP, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury in the Baharampur seat. The Left Front constituent RSP has nominated Id Mohammad, while the BJP has named Krishna Joyardar. In Krishnagar, the TMC has fielded Mahua Moitra against BJP’s Kalyan Chaubey, a footballer. The Congress has nominated Intaj Ali Shah and the CPI(M) Shantanu Jha.
Ranaghat (SC) will see TMC’s Rupali Biswas locking horns with BJP’s Jagannath Sarkar. Congress has nominated Minati Biswas and the CPI(M) Rama Biswas.
In the Burdwan East (SC) seat, TMC’s Sunil Kumar Mondal will contest against Paresh Chandra Das of the BJP. The Congress has fielded Siddhartha Majumdar and the CPI(M) Iswar Chandra Das.
Mamtaz Sanghamita is the TMC candidate from the Burdwan-Durgapur seat against BJP’s S S Ahluwalia. The Congress has nominated Ranajit Mukherjee and the CPI(M) named Abhas Ray Chaudhuri.
The Seven-phase LS poll will end on My 19 when Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s constituency Varanasi would also go to polls. The results would be out on May 23.