E-Paper
Low voter turnout in Azamgarh, Rampur bypolls
An average of 48.58% polling reported on Azamgarh LS seat till 6pm while 41% voters exercise their right to franchise on Rampur seat till 6pm, say officials
LUCKNOW The by-elections to Azamgarh and Rampur Lok Sabha seats were marked by low turnout of voters on Thursday. An average of 48.58% polling was reported on Azamgarh LS seat till 6 pm while 41% voters exercised their right to franchise on Rampur LS seat till 6pm, said officials.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha election, Rampur had recorded 63.19% polling and Azamgarh saw 57.56% polling.
Uttar Pradesh chief electoral officer, Ajay Kumar Shukla, said the bypolls in Azamgarh and Rampur LS seats were peaceful and there was no report of any untoward incident. When asked about the Samajwadi Party’s allegations of intimidation of voters and irregularities in voting, Shukla said the complaints were probed by the observers and the charges were found baseless. The report had been sent to the Election Commission of India, he said.
In the morning, the voter turnout remained low on both the Lok Sabha seats. Till 9am, 7.86% votes were polled in Rampur and 9.21% in Azamgarh. At 3pm, 32.19% votes were polled in Rampur and 37.82% in Azamgarh LS constituency. The fate of six candidates contesting on Rampur seat and 13 contesting on Azamgarh Lok Sabha seat had been sealed. The counting of votes will be on June 26.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) conducted live webcasting of the polling at 75% polling centres in Azamgarh and Rampur. It was monitored at three levels - district election officer, UP chief electoral officer and the Election Commission of India.
In Rampur, the BJP fielded Ghanshyam Singh Lodhi, who recently joined the party while Asim Raja, handpicked by Azam Khan, was the SP candidate. The Mayawati-led BSP did not contest from Rampur.
The Azamgarh seat is seeing a triangular contest among BJP’s Dinesh Lal Yadav ‘Nirhaua’, a Bhojpuri actor-singer, SP’s Dharmendra Yadav and BSP’s Shah Alam aka ‘Guddu Jamali’.
Of the 18.38 lakh voters in Azamgarh, 9,70,249 are men, 8,67,942 women and 36 belong to the third gender category.
Officials said 2,176 booths were set up at 1,149 polling stations of the constituency, where an estimated 15% of the population is Muslims. In Rampur, the community makes up for a little less than half of the population.
All four assembly segments -- Azamgarh, Mubarakpur, Sagdi, Gopalpur and Mehnagar -- falling in Azamgarh Lok Sabha constituency were won by the SP in the recent state elections.
During the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, there was an alliance between the SP and the BSP, and Akhilesh Yadav won easily, getting 6.21 lakh votes against BJP’s Dinesh Lal Yadav ‘Nirhaua’, who got 3.61 lakh votes.
While central BJP leaders remained away from campaigning this time, Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath sought votes for the BJP on the two seats.
However, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav and his wife Dimple Yadav did not campaign in the bypolls.
In the 2019 LS elections, Azam Khan bagged 5,59,177 votes. BJP candidate Jaya Prada got 4,49,180 votes and Congress candidate Sanjay Kapoor lost his deposit in Rampur. (with agency input)
