LUCKNOW: Over 24 percent polling has been recorded till 11am in the eight Lok Sabha seats of western Uttar Pradesh in the first leg of the seven-phased general elections.
Three Union ministers — VK Singh (Ghaziabad), Satyapal Singh (Baghpat) and Mahesh Sharma (Gautam Buddha Nagar) — are contesting in this phase.
The Election Commission said 25.60 percent polling was recorded in Saharanpur; 24 percent in Kairana; 26.4 percent in Muzaffarnagar; 25.10 percent in Bijnor; 21.80 percent in Meerut; 25 percent in Baghpat; 22.40 percent in Ghaziabad and 24.24 percent in Gautam Buddh Nagar.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is making all-out efforts to retain all the eight Lok Sabha seats while the fledgling Samajwadi Party-Bahujan Samaj Party-Rashtriya Lok Dal alliance too is going whole hog to upset the saffron party’s apple cart.
In the 2014 parliamentary elections, the BJP had won all the eight seats– Saharanpur, Kairana, Muzaffarnagar, Bijnor, Meerut, Baghpat, Ghaziabad and Gautam Buddh Nagar.
The communally sensitive seat of Muzaffarnagar will see a clash of titans with RLD chief Ajit Singh locking horns with sitting BJP lawmaker Sanjeev Balyan.
For the BJP, the Kairana parliamentary constituency holds immense significance as it had tasted defeat in the Lok Sabha by-election last year.
Elaborate security arrangements have been made for this phase and over one lakh security personnel have been deployed to ensure free and fair polls, Additional Director General, Law and Order of Uttar Pradesh Police Anand Kumar said.
Prominent among those in the fray include– Imran Masood (Congress) and Raghav Lakhanpal (BJP) from Saharanpur, and Tabassum Begum (SP) from Kairana.
In Bijnor, Congress candidate and former UP minister (during Mayawati”s tenure) Naseemuddin Siddiqui will challenge Raja Bharatendra Singh, while in Meerut, BJP”s Rajendra Agarwal will be hoping for a repeat of 2014, while BSP”s Hazi Mohammad Yaqub will be trying to checkmate him.
In Baghpat, Union minister Satyapal Singh is pitted against Jayant Chaudhary (RLD), son of Ajit Singh.
Dolly Sharma of the Congress is contesting against Union minister V K Singh, while in Gautam Buddh Nagar, it is Union minister and BJP candidate Mahesh Sharma versus Arvind Kumar Singh of the Congress.
Politically crucial Uttar Pradesh sends 80 MPs to the Lok Sabha. Of the 80 seats in UP, SP is contesting on 37 seats, BSP on 38 seats, and the RLD will contest on three seats. UP will have seven-phase polling.
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