With political parties grappling with the selection of candidates for the 403 assembly seats in the Uttar Pradesh, the Election Commission of India (ECI) will set the ball rolling for the 7-phase crucial UP polls as the nominations for the first phase begin on Friday,
Termed as a semi-final before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, UP is witnessing large-scale defections in all the major political parties, with three cabinet ministers of the Yogi Adityanath government resigning and likely to join the Samajwadi Party.
Several MLAs from Bharatiya Janata Party, Samajwadi Party and Congress too are joining other political parties.
On the other hand, the ECI will issue notification for the first phase of polls to 58 assembly constituencies covering 11 districts in western UP at 1100 hours on Friday to kick start the poll process.
State Chief Electoral Officer Ajay Kumar Shukla said here on Thursday that all preparation for the issuance of notification for the first phase polls had been completed.
“Nominations in these 58 assembly seats will commence with strictly following Covid norms and guidelines,” he said.
Already over 120 companies of Central forces have reached UP to maintain law and order during the polls.
The ECI has announced a 7-phase poll this time similar to 2017 polls though the duration has been reduced by five days. In 2017, the poll dates were announced on January 4, and the results were declared on March 11. This time, the Election Commission has announced the polls on January 8 and the results will be declared on March 10.
The poll process will commence from January 14, with the issuance of notification for the first phase starting from western UP where polling will be held on February 10.
The polling dates for UP are February 10,14, 20, 23, 27 March 3, and 7. Counting of votes for all 403 seats will be taken up on March 10.
A total of 58 assembly constituencies will go to the polls in the first phase in 11 districts of Shamli, Meerut, Muzaffarnagar, Baghpat, Meerut Hapur, Ghaziabad, Bulandshahr, Mathura, Agra, and Aligarh.
In the 2017 elections, BJP had won in 53 of these 58 assembly constituencies while SP and BSP won 2 seats each and RLD one.