Lucknow, May 13 (Inditop) Polling began Wednesday morning in 14 of Uttar Pradesh’s 80 Lok Sabha seats in the fifth and final phase of the general elections.
“Polling began at 7 a.m. after a routine mock poll by officials at all the 20,807 polling stations,” deputy state election officer Atiq Ahmed told Inditop.
As many as 203 candidates, including 15 women, are in the fray for the 14 seats. Polling in the other 66 seats was conducted in a staggered manner April 16, April 23, April 30 and May 7.
The constituencies going to the polls Wednesday are Rampur, Pilibhit, Budaun, Moradabad, Dharhaura, Bijnore, Barielly, Aonla, Shahjahanpur, Kheri, Sambhal, Amroha, Nagina and Saharanpur. They fall in western Uttar Pradesh, covering a large part of the agriculturally rich ‘terai’ belt.
About 19.5 million people are eligible to decide the fate of the candidates, prominent among whom were filmstar turned politician Jaya Prada of the Samajwadi Party, cricketer turned politician Mohammad Azharuddin of the Congress, Bhartiya Janata Party’s rabble rouser Varun Gandhi and his mother Maneka Gandhi.
rounak