Polling for the Bastar Lok Sabha seat, reserved for Scheduled Tribe candidates, will be held on April 11, the lone seat in Chhattisgarh to witness polling in the first phase.
All the preparations for the polling party to leave for their respective polling booths have been completed. Bastar division has five districts covered under eight assembly constituencies having 13,77,946 electors. Bastar with 7,15,550 female voters surpassed 6,62,355 male voters. The constituency also has 41 voters from third gender. A total of 1880 polling centres have been made for electors while two are additional polling centres. Bastar has 224 highly sensitive and 512 sensitive polling centres. Many parts of the constituency was inaccessible by roads and hence polling teams will be dropped at polling centres there by helicopter. Fates of seven candidates will be decided. The contestants are Ayatu Ram Mandavi of Bahujan Samaj Party, Deepak Baij of Indian National Congress, Baiduram Kashyap of Bharatiya Janata Party, Ramu Ram Maurya of Communist Party of India, Panish Prasad Nag of Ambedkarite Party of India, Manglaram Karma of Akhil Bharat Samagra Kranti Party and Suresh alias Sargim Kawasi of Shiv Sena. In assembly segments of Kondagaon, Chitrakot, Bastar and Jagdalpur polling will be held from 7am to 5pm.
In assembly constituencies of Narayanpur, Dantewada, Bijapur and Konta polling will be held from 7am to 3pm due to security reasons.