TN gets ready to vote
The fate of 571 candidates would be decided on Monday as the nearly 4.72 crore electorate would vote for 39 Lok Sabha seats from Tamil Nadu.
The fate of 571 candidates would be decided on Monday as the nearly 4.72 crore electorate would be voting to elect their representatives for 39 Lok Sabha seats from Tamil Nadu.
While the North Chennai constituency has the maximum number of over 20 lakh voters, Perambalur (Res) has the minimum number of 9.99 lakh voters.
The South Chennai constituency has the maximum number of contestants -- 35, while Pollachi and Perambalur (both res) constituencies have seven candidates each.
The prominent personalities, who are in the fray include Union minister Pon Radhakrishnan (BJP Nagercoil), former union ministers, T R Baalu (DMK-south Madras), A K Moorthy (PMK-Chengalpattu), Ginjee Ramachandran (MDMK-Vandavasi), E Ponnusamy (PMK-Chidambaram), K V Thanga Balu (Cong-Salem), R Prabhu (Cong-Nilgiris), Dr Subramanian Swamy (Janata-Madurai), A Raja (DMK-Perambalur) Dhanushkodi Adhithan (Cong-Tirunelveli), P Chidambaram (Cong- Sivaganga).
The State Chief electoral officer Mrutyunjay Sarangi has warned of stern action against those attempting impersonation during the polls. Such persons would be arrested immediately, he said.
Over 50,000 Electronic Voting Machines would be used for recording votes in 45,729 polling booths in the state.
As many as 13 of the 39 Lok Sabha seats in Tamil Nadu, including three in the city, going to the polls in the last phase tomorrow, have been identified as 'hypersensitive' constituencies, Sarangi said.
In the past, constituencies with a history of communal tensions were declared as hypersensitive.
The lacklustre campaign, stretching for over two months, focused on local issues with the DPA, the rainbow alliance formed by the DMK with the Congress, PMK, MDMK and left parties mainly harping on the drinking water shortage, withdrawal of free power to farmers and central value added tax on handloom and powerloom textiles.
The AIADMK supremo Jayalalithaa vehemently supported the candidature of A B Vajpayee for the Prime Ministership and criticised the DMK-led alliance as opportunistic and described the Congress-DMK allianche as 'unholy'.
Vajpayee and Jayalalithaa blamed the Congress for toppling the Gujral Government in 1998 for not dropping DMK Ministers from the cabinet as per its demand. 'Both Congress and DMK owe an explanation to the people how they came together', Vajpayee told at an election rally.
MDMK Chief Vaiko, who came out on bail after his 18 months detention under POTA, drew big crowds, wherever he campaigned.
As the Lok Sabha polls are being considered as a referendum on the AIADMK Government, opposition leaders took no chance and criss crossed the state to woo the voters.
For the AIADMK-BJP combine, Prime Minister Vajpayee, Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani, External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha and AIADMK supremo Jayalalithaa campaigned.
The main plank of the BJP-AIADMK combine was a vote for NDA was a vote for Vajpayee and for stability at the Centre.