Hyderabad: Voting for the first phase of Lok Sabha polls will be held from 7 am to 6 pm on April 19. Among the 21 states and union territories, 15 seats from north east will go for polls tomorrow.
Arunachal Pradesh
Arunachal Pradesh will witness a single-phase polling for its two seats- Arunachal West and Arunachal East.
Presently, the 60-member assembly is held by BJP with Prema Khandu as the Chief Minister. In the previous 2019 Lok Sabha elections, BJP had won both the seats and won 10 assembly seats unopposed.
The Arunachal West is held by BJP's Kiran Riju, Union Minister of Earth Science and Food Processing Industries and Arunachal East by Tapir Gao of BJP.
Former Arunachal CM and state Congress president Nabam Tuki is contesting from Arunachal West. Tuki, who had lost this seat to Riju in 2019, is confident of victory this time citing a desire for change among voters. 52-year-old Riju has been representing Arunachal West since 2004.
In 2014, BJP and Congress had won one seat each while in 2009 both seats were in Congress's kitty. Prior to which, in 2004, the two seats were held by BJP.
Apart from BJP and Congress, a total of 10 candidates are in the fray for the two seats.
Assam
Seats where polling would be held tomorrow are Dibrugarh, Jorhat, Kaziranga, Lakhimpur and Sonitpur. Though initially Congress held sway over the Lok Sabha seats in this state, BJP's rise since 2014 has changed the dynamics.
Sarbananda Sonowal, former Assam CM and Union Minister of Ports, Shipping and Waterways and Ayush, is contesting from Dibrugarh. BJP has replaced sitting MP Rameshwar Teli by Sonowal for this seat. He will be pitted against Assam Jatiya Parishad candidate Lurinjyoti Gogoi, party president.
In Jorhat, the contest is between BJP's sitting MP Topon Kumar Gogoi and Congress candidate Gaurav Gogoi, whose father held the seat twice in 1971 and 1977.
Tripura
Of the two seats, Tripura West will go for polls tomorrow. BJP candidate Biplab Kumar Deb, former Tripura CM will contest against Congress's Asish Kumar Saha, state party president. This seat has a considerable number of ST and minority voters apart from Bengali voters.
Among the other north east states going for polls tomorrow are:
Manipur: Inner Manipur, Outer Manipur
Meghalaya: Shillong, Tura
Mizoram: Mizoram
Nagaland: Nagaland
Sikkim: Sikkim
Among the key candidates of the first phase include Angomcha Bimol Akoijam, a Jawaharlal Nehru University professor who has been fielded on a Congress ticket from Inner Manipur. Akoijam. He will contest against BJP candidate Thounaojam Basanta Kumar Singh.
The other states where polling will be conducted are namely Bihar (4 seats), Chhattisgarh (1 seat), Madhya Pradesh (6), Maharashtra (5), Rajasthan (12), Tamil Nadu (39), Uttar Pradesh (8), Uttarakhand (5), West Bengal (3), Andaman and Nicobar (1), Jammu and Kashmir (1), Lakshadweep (1) and Puducherry (1).
According to the Election Commission of India, nearly 16.63 crore people are eligible to cast their votes at 1.87 polling stations on the first phase of polling day. Around 18 lakh polling personnel have been deployed for this phase. This phase has the highest number of constituencies.
A total of 1625 candidates are in the fray. Forty one helicopters, 84 special trains and one lakh vehicles have been deployed to ferry polling and security personnel.
In order to ensure peaceful polling, webcasting will be done in more than 50 percent of the polling stations along with deployment of micro observers. A total of 4627 Flying Squads, 5208 Statistics Surveillance Teams, 2028 Video Surveillance Teams and 1255 Video Viewing Teams will work round the clock.
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