Nagaland, Meghalaya Assembly polls begin; high turnouts expected

Nagaland and Meghalaya assembly polls begin today amid strict security arrangements. Around 36 lakh voters of the two states would elect their representatives for the 59 seats each.

Shillong/Kohima: Polling for Nagaland and Meghalaya, two Christian-majority states of northeast India, have begun today. Around 21.61 lakh electors in Meghalaya and 13.9 lakh voters of Nagaland are exercising their franchise to choose representatives from 552 candidates (369 in Meghalaya and 183 in Nagaland).

Both Meghalaya and Nagaland have 60-member Houses but elections will be held for 59 assembly constituencies. In Nagaland, one BJP candidate was declared the uncontested winner after his opponent withdrew his nomination while in Meghalaya, the election for the Sohiong Assembly constituency was postponed due to the death of a United Democratic Party candidate recently.

In both northeastern states, the elections would begin at 7 am and continue till 4 pm. Security arrangements in the states have been ramped up for the elections. Paramilitary forces have already been deployed for the 3,419 polling stations in Meghalaya and 2,315 polling stations in Nagaland. Campaigning in these poll-bound states ended at 4 pm on February 25.

Officials said they are expecting high turnouts in both states given that the last few elections have registered over 80 percent turnouts. Tripura, which went to polls on February 16 had also recorded a healthy turnout of 90%.

Earlier, Meghalaya chief minister and president of the National People's Party (NPP) Conrad K Sangma had appealed to voters to cast their votes after considering the state's future. In this state, a total of 11 parties are contesting in the polls. The BJP and Congress have managed to field candidates in all the seats while the ruling National People's Party (NPP) is fighting in 57 seats, United Democratic Party in 46 seats and newcomer Trinamool Congress is contesting in 56 constituencies.

In Nagaland, the incumbent BJP-NDPP coalition is fighting the polls in all seats. While BJP has fielded candidates in 20 seats, NDPP has fielded in 40. The counting of votes for Meghalaya and Nagaland as well as Tripura will be on March 2. It may be mentioned here that elections were held in Tripura on February 16 and out of 28.14 lakh voters, a total of 24.66 lakh cast their votes.

The Election Commission of India records for Meghalaya revealed that in the 2018 Assembly polls, Congress had a vote share of 29 percent with 21 seats, NPEP's vote share was 21 percent with 19 seats, BJP won only two seats registering a vote share of 10 percent and other parties won 17 seats.

Prior to this, in 2013, Congress had a vote share of 35 percent (29 seats) and other parties had a vote share of 64 percent (31) while no seats went to BJP. In Nagaland, the Election Commission of India data revealed, in the last Assembly election in 2018, the Naga People's Front (NPF) managed a vote share of 39 percent (26 seats), BJP's vote share was 15 percent (12 seats) and other parties had 45 percent vote share (21 seats). There are a total of 13.9 lakh votes of which 30,000 are first-time voters.

In 2013, NPF had a vote share of 47 percent with 38 seats, BJP had only 2 percent vote share with 1 seat and other parties had 51 percent vote share with 20 seats.