LS polls|Campaigning ends in Shopian, Pulwama and Ladakh

Notification issued for Jammu Lok Sabha seat; April 4 last date to file nominations --- Representational Photo

The curtains fell on the election campaigning for Anantnag and Ladakh Lok Sabha seats on Saturday evening, which along with 49 other Lok Sabha seats in seven states will go to polls on May 6.

The polling will be held on Monday in two seats in Jammu andKashmir, 14 seats in Uttar Pradesh, 12 in Rajasthan, seven seats each in WestBengal and Madhya Pradesh, five in Bihar, four in Jharkhand.

   

The twin south Kashmir districts Shopian and Pulwama aregoing to polls during the third leg of the polling for Anantnag Lok Sabha seaton May 6 even as electorate in Kargil and Leh districts will cast their ballotfor Ladakh parliamentary seat on the same day.

The first two rounds of the three-phased elections forAnantnag Lok Sabha seat were held on April 23 and 29. 

During the last leg of the elections, south Kashmir’s twindistricts witnessed a scanty political campaigning.

On the last day of campaigning,  former Chief Minister and National Conferenceleader Omar Abdullah addressed a poll rally at Mujahid Manzil in Pulwama. 

Except for some closed door meetings, the political partiesgave big rallies and road shows a miss in both the districts.

Former Chief Minister and Peoples Democratic Party presidentMehbooba Mufti began her poll campaign by leading a protest march on April 24in Pulwama.

The march was taken out from Town Hall to Deputy Commissioner’soffice and on the same day she addressed a workers’ meeting in the lawns ofCircuit House on the edge of Shopian town.

Similarly, Omar Abdullah held a workers meeting at CircuitHouse in Shopian and Mujahid Manzil in Pulwama on April 30 and May 1respectively.

State Congress party chief Ghulam Ahmad Mir and the BhartiyaJanta Party leader Sofi Yousuf also paid single visit respectively to thedistricts and held closed door meetings to woo the voters.

During the last leg of the three-phased polling for theseat, over 5.22 lakh voters are scheduled to cast their ballot on May 6.

The two districts are sprawling over six assembly segmentsof Tral, Pampore, Pulwama, Rajpora, Shopian and Wachi. 

A total number of 18 candidates including NationalConference’s Justice (retired) Husnain Masoodi, PDP’s Mehbooba Mufti  Congress Party’s Ghulam Ahmad  Mir and Bhartiya Janta Party’s Sofi Yousufare in the fray.

Masoodi and Mufti are seen as the main contenders for theprestigious seat in this final leg of polling.

In 2014 elections, the seat was won  by Mufti. She, however, resigned in 2016after she took over as the Chief Minister of state. 

Ladakh

In Ladakh, a total number of 1.74 lakh electorate willexercise their franchise. A four cornered contest will be witnessed  between Congress party’s Rigzin Spalbar,BJP’s Jamying Tsering Namgayal and Independent candidates Asgar Ali Karbalaiand Sajad Kargili.

The PDP and The National Conference did not field their candidatein the Ladakh and extended their support to Kargili.

While Karbalai, a former Congress law maker is supported byImam Khomieni Memorial Trust, Kargili enjoys the support of influential IslamiaSchool in Kargil district.

On the last day of canvassing, in both Ladakh and Kargildistricts a high decibel campaigning by all the four candidates and theirsupporters was witnessed to woo the voters.

Across country

Campaigning ended Saturday evening for elections to 51 LokSabha seats in six northern and eastern states besides the Bundelkhand regionof Madhya Pradesh in the fifth phase on May 6 with Union ministers RajnathSingh, Rajyavardhan Rathore, Smriti Irani, Jayant Sinha and Arjun Ram Meghwaland top Congress leaders Sonia and Rahul Gandhi and among those in the fray.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi led the BJP’s campaigning,holding several rallies. BJP chief Amit Shah, Congress president Rahul Gandhiand a host of Union ministers among others also canvassed for their partycandidates in the past few days, undertaking whirlwind tours of constituencies.

In West Bengal, the BJP candidate from Bongaon (SC) seat,Shantanu Thakur, was injured in a road accident. A police van lost control andhit Thakur’s vehicle at the front when he was heading towards Kalyani to attendan election rally on the last day of campaigning, police said.

Thakur, his driver and two others who were in the vehicle,were injured, they said.

Campaigning in the state during the past couple of days wasmarred by panic over Cyclone Fani, which caused large scale destruction inneighbouring Odisha, with political parties cancelling their election meetings.

Seats in which elections will be held on Monday areBongaon(SC), Barrackpur, Howrah, Uluberia, Serampore, Hooghly and Arambagh (SC)where an electorate of 1,16,91,889 will decide the fate of 83 candidates, theElection Commission said.

In Bihar, Modi canvassed in favour of the BJP candidates asalso nominees fielded by alliance partners JD(U) and LJP.

He described the ruling NDA in the state as a cohesivethree-in-one entity and the opposition weak, loosely knit and helpless againstmenaces of black money, corruption and threats to national security.

BJP MPs Ajay Nishad and Rajiv Pratap Rudy are seekingre-election from their respective seats of Muzaffarpur and Saran respectivelyin Bihar.      LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan,who has announced that he would no longer contest direct elections, has fieldedhis younger brother and state minister Pashupati Kumar Paras from his pocketborough of Hajipur.

A high-decibel campaign for seven Lok Sabha constituenciesin the Bundelkhand region of Madhya Pradesh also ended Saturday.

Polling for Tikamgarh, Damoh, Khajuraho, Satna, Rewa,Hoshangabad and Betul seats, all held by the BJP currently, will take place Monday.

This will be the second phase of polling in Madhya Pradesh,the first phase having been held on April 29.

Union minister Virendra Kumar Khatik is the BJP candidatefrom Tikamgarh while former Union minister and sitting MP Prahlad Patel is theparty’s Damoh candidate.

Modi Saturday addressing rallies in Pratapgarh and Basti inUttar Pradesh and said the SP-BSP alliance partners will be at each other’sthroats when the results are out on May 23. He also accused the Samajwadi Partyof going soft on the Congress, saying the two parties are playing a “biggame” against Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati.

The BJP had bagged 12 of the 14 seats in 2014 with SoniaGandhi winning in Rae Bareli and Rahul in Amethi.

The other UP seats going to the polls on May 6 areDhaurahra, Sitapur, Mohanlalganj (SC), Lucknow, Banda, Fatehpur, Kaushambi(SC), Barabanki (SC), Faizabad, Bahraich (SC), Kaiserganj and Gonda.

Union Home Minister Singh is seeking re-election fromLucknow, while his colleague at the Centre Irani is again taking on Rahul inAmethi.

Rajasthan also saw hectic campaigning by the BJP and theCongress over the past week for the 12 seats.

Union ministers Rathore (Jaipur rural) and Meghwal(Bikaner), Congress MLA and Olympian Krishna Poonia (Jaipur rural), BhanwarJitendra Singh (Alwar) are some of the contestants in this last phase ofpolling in the state.

In Jharkhand, among those in the fray is Union ministerJayant Sinha.

In Jammu and Kashmir, Pulwama and Shopian districts are going to polls on May 6 in the third leg of polling in the Anantnag Lok Sabha constituency. Polling will also be held in Ladakh on Monday.

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