New Delhi: Voting for the fifth round of the national election began with reports of violence from West Bengal and Jammu and Kashmir. The BJP candidate in Bengal’s Barrackpore alleged that he was attacked by Trinamool Congress workers on Monday morning. A grenade was thrown at a polling booth in Jammu and Kashmir’s Pulwama. No one was injured in the attack.
A number of high-profile candidates, including Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, his mother Sonia Gandhi, Union ministers Rajnath Singh and Rajyavardhan Rathore are up for election in the fifth of the seven phases of the Lok Sabha election on Monday.
With only 51 seats across seven states where voting is being held, this is the leanest phase of the election. But it will be crucial for the BJP, which won 40 of the seats in 2014 and is under pressure to do better. With this round, election will be over in 424 seats, polling in the remaining 118 seats will be held on May 12 and 19. Counting of votes will be held on May 23.
Voting began in 14 seats in Uttar Pradesh, 12 in Rajasthan, seven seats each in West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh, five in Bihar and four in Jharkhand on Monday. In Jammu and Kashmir, polling is taking place in Ladakh constituency, Pulwama and Shopian districts of Anantnag seat.
Congress chief Rahul Gandhi is seeking re-election for a fourth consecutive term from family turf Amethi. Challenging him is the BJP’s Smriti Irani, who, despite her defeat from the seat in 2014, has frequently visited the area.
Rahul Gandhi’s mother, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, is seeking a fourth term from neighbouring Raebareli. She has been holding the seat after vacating Amethi for Rahul Gandhi in 2004. Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh is seeking re-election from Lucknow.
Arjun Singh, the BJP candidate from West Bengal’s Barrackpore, alleged that he was punched by workers of Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress. “I was attacked by TMC goons while I was trying to talk with voters. It was a planned attack and I will report the matter to the Election Commission. The TMC’s hooligans are running unchecked in the state. My bleeding mouth is a proof of it,” he said.
Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party is contesting in five seats – Dhaurahra, Sitapur, Mohanlalganj, Fatehpur and Kaisarganj. Its ally Samajwadi Party is contesting in seven seats – Lucknow, Banda, Kaushambi, Barabanki, Faizabad, Bahraich and Gonda. Voting will be held in the politically crucial seat of Faizabad, which encompasses Ayodhya, in this round.
Pulwama, the Ground Zero of the February 14 suicide attack in which 40 soldiers died, is voting in the third phase of polling for Jammu and Kashmir’s Anantnag constituency. No one was injured in a grenade attack at a polling booth in Pulwama. Pulwama remains tense and wary. The district has hardly seen any election campaigning by political parties and officers of the local police say polling may not cross the double-digit mark.
Two former Olympians – Union minister Rajyavardhan Rathore of the BJP and Krishna Poonia of the Congress – one former IAS and one former IPS officer, and two seers are among the candidates for Rajasthan’s 12 Lok Sabha seats. This is the last phase of polling in the desert state, which the Congress wrested from the BJP in last year’s assembly election.
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