E-Paper
Uttar Pradesh urban local body polls: 53% turnout in second phase, polling largely peaceful
Kanpur Dehat records highest polling percentage of 67.37, Kanpur Nagar lowest of 42.64 in the second and final phase of the Uttar Pradesh urban local body polls
Around 53% of the 1.92 crore (19.2 million) eligible voters turned up to exercise their franchise in the second and final phase of the urban local body (ULB) polls in 38 districts of Uttar Pradesh on Thursday, according to the state election commission (SEC).
“Polling in the second phase was peaceful in all the districts, barring stray incidents of minor clashes in some districts. There was no report of any major untoward incident. The state election commission monitored polling at the sensitive booths through webcasting, CCTV and video cameras, ” state election commissioner (SEC) Manoj Kumar said.
Minor clashes were reported from Azamgarh, Kanpur and Bulandshahr and some other districts.
Among seven prominent districts with municipal corporations, Meerut recorded 50.01% polling, Ghaziabad 45.52%, Bareilly 50.49%, Shahjahanpur 55.48%, Aligarh 50.48%, Kanpur Nagar 42.64% and Ayodhya 52.6%.
Kanpur Dehat recorded the highest turnout of 67.37% among all the districts in this phase and Kanpur Nagar the lowest at 42.64%.
Votes were cast amid tight security to fill 6,929 civic body seats. These included seven mayoral seats, 95 posts of nagar palika parishad chairperson, 267 nagar panchayat chairpersons, 581 corporators, 2,520 nagar palika parishad members and 3,459 Nagar Panchayat members.
Special director general (SDG), Law and Order, Prashant Kumar said polling in the second phase was by and large held peacefully.
He said some stray incidents were reported but the law-and-order situation was under control.
He said there were 6,380 polling centres and 19,584 polling booths in the second phase. The UP police were now gearing up for the counting process to be held across the state on Saturday (May 13), he said.
Polling was slow in the morning but gradually picked up in the afternoon.
Till 9am, 9.41% votes were cast. The polling percentage went up to 20.62% till 11am and 30.80% till 1pm. It increased further to 40.80% till 3pm and to 49.33% till 5pm before settling at 53%. The first phase of the election in 37 districts was held on May 4.
In Kanpur, Vidhan Sabha speaker Satish Mahana and minister Rakesh Sachan cast their votes. Uttar Pradesh finance minister Suresh Khanna, cooperatives minister JPS Rathore and PWD minister Jitin Prasad exercised their franchise in Shahjahanpur.
Minister of state (independent charge) for environment, forest and climate change Arun Kumar exercised his franchise in Bareilly. Union minister of state General VK Singh (retd.) cast his vote in Ghaziabad. In a tweet in Hindi, he said voting was absolutely necessary to elect a development-oriented public representative. Union minister and Apna Dal (Sonelal) leader Anupriya Patel voted in Mirzapur.
BJP MP from Kanpur Satyadev Pachauri denied the opposition’s charges of rigging. The Samajwadi Party alleged malpractices in Kannauj, Basti, Ghaziabad, Budaun and Mahoba districts.
A video of SP nagar palika parishad chairperson candidate from Bulandshahr Archana Pandey sobbing went viral. She alleged misbehaviour by BJP supporters outside a polling centre.
The SP and BJP workers clashed near polling booths in Farrukhabad and Basti districts.
Another police official said supporters of two independent corporator candidates Sanjay Nishad and Mahendra Yadav in Gauri Shankar ward of Azamgarh district clashed after Nishad blamed Yadav for bogus voting. He said the supporters were removed from the polling centre after police intervention.
A similar incident was reported when supporters of BJP corporator candidate Abhinav Shukla and independent candidate from Kanpur’s Pashupati Nagar ward got involved in a manhandling incident over the presence of one of their supporters outside a polling booth. The matter was resolved after intervention of polling officials and police.
The general complaint among voters, particularly the minorities, was that their names were missing from the voter list en masse.
Amid tight security arrangements, voters cast their votes in Mau, considered the stronghold of jailed former MLA Mukhtar Ansari. According to locals, there is triangular fight among the SP, BSP and BJP for the post of Mau municipal council chairman. The Congress has fielded Vishnu Kushwaha, the BSP Arshad Jamal, the SP Abid Akhtar and the BJP Ajai Kumar in Mau.
Tight security was in place in Sonbhadra, which shares its borders with Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. Long queues of voters were seen in Ghorawal and other towns of the district. Ghorawal circle officer Amit Kumar said, “Tight security arrangements were put in place at polling centres.”
Voting concluded peacefully in Mirzapur too. Long queues were seen at polling booths.
A few clashes between supporters of candidates and injury to two police personnel were reported in an incident of stone-pelting at Kidwai Nagar of Baraut in Baghpat district on Wednesday night.
Additional force was called and 12 people were taken into custody. Inspector of Baraut police station Janak Singh Chauhan said the two police personnel who sustained injuries were undergoing treatment.
“A case has been registered against 10 persons and 40 unknown persons and further action will be initiated after polling,” Chauhan said.
Otherwise, polling was largely peaceful in Meerut, Baghpat and Bulandshahar districts on Thursday.
Minor clashes were reported between supporters of BJP and independent candidates at a booth in Pallavpuram locality in Meerut.
Another minor clash was reported between BJP supporters and RLD workers at Taxshila School booth in Kankerkhera. The BJP’s mayoral candidate Harikant Ahluwalia and other party leaders accused the RLD supporters of preventing people from voting. The matter was reported to the police and officials rushed to the spot to ensure that all voters could cast their votes.
Polling was peaceful in Sant Kabir Nagar, Basti and Siddharthnagar districts barring a few incidents of minor clashes between supporters of political parties.
The seven municipal corporations (nagar nigams) that went to the polls on Thursday included Meerut, Ghaziabad, Bareilly, Shahjahanpur, Aligarh, Kanpur Nagar and Ayodhya. Shahjahanpur will vote for the first time as a nagar nigam. Four out of the seven mayoral seats were won by the BJP in the last civic elections in 2017. They are Ghaziabad, Bareilly, Kanpur Nagar and Ayodhya.
While the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) won the Aligarh and Meerut seats, the SP drew a blank the last time. Shahjahanpur, the hometown and assembly constituency of state finance minister Suresh Khanna, was upgraded into a municipal corporation in 2018.
The districts that went to polls on Thursday included Meerut, Hapur, Gautam Buddh Nagar, Ghaziabad, Baghpat, Bulandshahr, Bareilly, Budaun, Shahjahanpur, Pilibhit, Hathras, Kasganj, Etah, Aligarh, Kanpur, Kanpur Dehat, Farrukhabad, Etawah, Kannauj, Auraiya, Hamirpur, Chitrakoot ,Mahoba, Banda, Ayodhya, Sultanpur, Ambedkar Nagar, Barabanki, Amethi, Basti, Sant Kabir Nagar, Siddharthnagar, Azamgarh, Mau, Ballia, Sonbhadra, Mirzapur and Bhadohi.
TENSION IN AMETHI
Tension prevailed in Amethi on Thursday after Samajwadi Party’s Gauriganj MLA Rakesh Pratap Singh and his supporters allegedly clashed with Deepak Kumar Singh, husband of BJP candidate for the post of Gauriganj nagar palika chairperson Rashmi Singh, on the Gauriganj police station premises in Amethi on Wednesday.
“Police deployment was further increased at polling centres of Gauriganj nagar palika, apprehending further trouble after the Wednesday incident,” a senior police official said.
He said the MLA, his brothers, son and nephews, went underground after the police registered an FIR on the complaint of Deepak Kumar Singh and slapped serious charges like attempt to murder against them.
