The battle for Uttar Pradesh – Machines are being replaced Shamli District Magistrate Jasjit Kaur said that they had received some complaints about EVMs and were replacing those machines. “Peaceful polling underway, no law and order situation anywhere,” Ms Kaur told news agency ANI.
has begun. 58 constituencies in the hub of farmers’ protest in the western part, go to polls today. It will be a four cornered contest.
In the first of the seven phase election, the 58 assembly constituencies are based in 11 districts. The districts where the elections will be held are Muzaffarnagar, Meerut, Baghpat, Ghaziabad, Shamli, Hapur, Gautam Buddh Nagar, Bulandshahr, Aligarh, Agra and Mathura.
The polling will commence at 7 am and will end at 6 pm.
As many as 623 candidates are in the fray in the first phase and around 2.27 crore people are eligible to vote.
The biggest challenger of the BJP is believed to be the coalition led by Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, who has augmented his Muslim-Yadav support base with small parties that command a following among the Other Backward Classes. His key ally is Jayant Chaudhary of Rashtriya Lok Dal, who is believed to have influence on more than 30 seats.
The election is also expected to be a test for the Congress’s Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who was tasked with winning UP four years ago.
Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party, which has a big support base among the Dalits and can have an impact on the results is also in the fray.
The BJP’s campaign in western UP revolves around the development plank by CM Yogi Adityanath and the state-center government narrative by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
n 2017, BJP bagged 53 of the 58 seats in these districts, while the Samajwadi Party and the BSP got two seats each. Out of these 58 seats, 20 have strong backward and minority influence, while out of 16 seats in Agra and Aligarh, Jats will be important on eight.
The counting of votes will be held on March 10. Results for election in four other states — Goa, Manipur, Punjab, and Uttarakhand — will also be announced the same day.
