Lucknow: With three phases of the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections done and dusted, polling for the fourth phase will take place today in the districts of Pilibhit, Unnao, Lakhimpur Kheri, Rae Bareli, Sitapur, Banda, Fatehpur, Hardoi and Lucknow. The polling, to be done in a total of 59 assembly seats, will importantly feature seats such as Lakhimpur, with a total of 624 candidates in the fray for the electoral battle.
Uttar Pradesh Chief Electoral Officer Ajay Kumar Shuka said on Tuesday that the "polling for the fourth phase will be conducted with neutrality and transparency. He further noted that a total of 6.24 crore voters will be going to polls, of whom 1.14 are male, 99.3 lakh are female and 966 are transgender. Out of the 624 candidates, 91 are women.
Significantly, the fourth phase will also see repolling at Karhal assembly constituency in Mainpuri, the home turf for SP leader and former UP chief minister Akhilesh Yadav. Polling booth no. 266, Jaswantpur Primary School in Karhal saw the presence of an unauthorized person inside the polling booth through webcasting. This, and the description of the incident from the returning officer has led to repolling in the phase from 7 am to 6 pm on Wednesday.
Rae Bareli, largely thought to be a Congress stronghold, maintained the image back in both 2017 and 2019 elections. Sitapur, Hardoi, and Unnao, on the other hand, saw BJP triumph in 2017 assembly elections. In Rae Bareli Sadar, Congress' five-time MLA Akhilesh Singh's daughter Aditi Singh will don BJP's colours, taking on Manish Singh Chouhan representing Congress. In Lucknow Cantonment, BJP's influential candidate Brijesh Pathak will lock horns against Samajwadi Party candidate Raju Gandhi. Hardoi can potentially see a tough contest, with Nitin Agarwal, BJP candidate and son of BJP leader Naresh Agarwal, taking on SP candidate Anil Verma. What makes the fight an interesting one is the perceived distance between senior Agarwal and BJP in the run-up to the assembly polls.
The fourth phase will see 24,643 polling booths and 13,817 polling centres, with a cap imposed by the ECI on the number of voters at 1,250 at all polling booths. To oversee the electoral process, nine Police Observers, 57 General Observers, and 18 Expenditure Observers in total have been deployed by the election commission to ensure smooth polling.
Of the 59 constituencies, three have categorised as 'sensitive' and 590 localities are labelled as 'vulnerable', according to the police. A total of 860 companies of the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) have been assigned for the fourth phase, who will be stationed in polling booths in the state. Additionally, 7,022 inspectors and sub-inspectors as well as 58,132 head constables and constables will be deployed alongside other forces.
Deployment of paramilitary forces has been ensured at each polling station and the responsibility of security of strong rooms of EVMs has also been given to paramilitary forces. 5595 heavy vehicles, 5773 light vehicles and 1 lakh 15 thousand 725 polling personnel have been deployed to conduct the election process.
