Voting is being held in 59 constituencies of Uttar Pradesh, including state capital Lucknow and Lakhimpur Kheri, today in the fourth phase of assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh.
Five seats under Raebareli, the bastion of Sonia Gandhi, are also voting. The seats are spread across the districts of Pilibhit, Lakhimpur Kheri, Sitapur, Hardoi, Unnao, Lucknow, Rae Bareli, Banda, and Fatehpur.
In 2017, the BJP bagged 51 seats, four had gone to the Samajwadi Party, two to the Congress and two to Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party. BJP’s ally Apna Dal (Sonelal) had bagged one seat.
The election in Lakhimpur Kheri is seen as a prestige battle for Union minister Ajay Mishra, whose son Ashish Mishra is a murder accused in the case involving the death of four farmers during a protest in October.
The farmers, unhappy over the Centre’s contentious farm laws, were hugely upset after Ashish Mishra’s SUV mowed down four of them. The farmers have challenged Ashish Mishra’s bail in the Supreme Court.
All 8 seats in Lakhimpur are with the BJP right now. Both the BJP and the SP have repeated their candidates on the Lakhimpur city seat . The BJP’s Yogesh Verma, who won the seat in the 2017 polls, will again face Samajwadi Party’s Utkarsh Verma Madhur. The Congress has fielded Ravi Shankar Trivedi.
The nine assembly seats in state capital Lucknow will vote today. The keenly watched contests will include Sarojini Nagar – where Rajeshwar Singh, the former joint director of Enforcement Directorate is in a straight fight against Abhishek Mishra, former IIM professor and a close aide of Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav.
State Law Minister Brijesh Pathak is facing Samajwadi party candidate and two-time Corporator Surendra Singh Gandhi in Lucknow Cantonment. State minister Ashutosh Tandon is in fray from Lucknow East against Anurag Bhadauria, the Samajwadi Party candidate.
In the high-profile Raebareli Sadar – part of Congress chief Sonia Gandhi’s parliamentary seat — sitting party MLA Aditi Singh joined the BJP and is facing Congress’s Manish Chauhan. Aditi Singh is the daughter of the constituency’s five-time MLA, the late Akhilesh Singh. Samajwadi Party has fielded RP Yadav.
To motivate women voters, the state police have created 137 “pink booths”, manned by women officers. Lucknow’s Christ Church College has announced that it will award 10 marks to the students whose parents will vote.
Voting for the remaining three phases of the seven-phase UP elections will take place on February 27, March 3, and 7. The counting of votes will take place on March 10.