-A total of 51,507 polling booths, including 10,415 urban ones, have been set up for the voting exercise
-Strong undercurrent in favour of Cong in Raj assembly polls: Gehlot
Jaipur, EW News : Rajasthan will face the ballot on 199 assembly seats on Saturday where over 5.26 crore electorate will decide the fate of 1,875 candidates.
A total of 51,507 polling booths, including 10,415 urban ones, have been set up for the voting exercise.
Though the voting was scheduled on 200 seats but election on one seat of Karanpur was postponed after Congress candidate Gurmeet Kunnar’s death, Praveen Gupta, Chief Election Officer here said on Friday. Voting will be held from 7 am to 6 pm.
Of 5.26 crore voters, 21.9 lakh new young voters (18-19 years) and 18,462 voters above the age of 100 years. Besides two major political parties, BSP’s 188 candidates, AAP’s 87, Rashtriya Loktantrik Party’s (RLP) 77, Bhartiya Tribal Party (BTP) 5 and CPI-M’s 17 contestants are vying the election. Out of 1875 candidates, the Congress has fielded 200 (with one alliance of RLD), BJP 200, Independents 737, BSP 185, AAP 86, RLD 78, and CPI-M Three.
Twenty-six ministers including Gehlot are also trying hard to return to their constituencies. Seventeen rebels of Congress, and 23 of BJP are among other third front parties facing triangular contests on at least 85 seats.
Congress has given tickets to contest polls only to 27 women (13.5 percent), and BJP 20 (10 percent). Besides the BJP, all other parties have given opportunities to muslims to try their luck for legislators.
Congress’ Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, Sachin PIlot, CP Joshi, Govind Singh Dotasara, Dr B D Kalla and BJP’s Vasundhara Raje, Rajendra Rathore, seven sitting BJP MPs and one of the RLP are among the 1875 contestants who are in the fray.
Rajasthan Police have deployed 1.70 lakh employees to provide fool proof security and a free and fair atmosphere to voters. This included 70,000 of police personnels, 18000 home guards, 2000 border home guards, 15000 home guards from other states, and paramilitary forces, and personnels of CRPF, CISF, SSB, and RPF.
Meanwhile, Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot claimed, there is a strong undercurrent in favour of the Congress in the state as one can see concrete changes on the ground thanks to the policies of the party government.
