6:20 am: This Assam polling booth has a red carpet!
There are 45 minutes to go for polling to start, but officials have been working round the clock to ensure everything goes well. Here are some visuals that ANI tweeted from Karnataka, Maharashtra and Vadodara. Also this “model” polling booth is Assam is all kinds of extra with balloons and a red carpet!
6:15 am: Voting Round 2 To Begin At 7 am
Listen up, folks. Phase 2 of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls will be conducted on Thursday, with 11 states and 1 union territory voting for 95 seats. Will there be more sneaky ad placing (remember the NaMo food packets)? Will candidates break more EVMs? Phase 1 has left us with so many questions.
As voting begins at 7 am, we will bring you live updates through the day—the good, the bad and the ugly.
If the first phase is anything to go by, the day is likely to be filled with activities ranging from ridiculous to plain sad, as the day progresses. (Want to know what the 7 most WTF moments from Phase 1 were? Of course you do.)
But here’s some quick info on how polling is spread across all the states. In Tamil Nadu, all the 39 constituencies will go to polls. So will the lone seat in neighbouring Union territory Puducherry. The other states are Karnataka (14 seats), Maharashtra (10 seats), Uttar Pradesh (8 seats), Assam (5 seats), Bihar (5 seats), Odisha (5 seats), Chhattisgarh (3 seats), West Bengal (3 seats) Jammu and Kashmir (2 seats) and Manipur (1 seat).
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Tripura East, one of Tripura’s two constituencies, was also expected to vote but polling was deferred to 23 April because, according to the chief electoral officer, “the law and order situation” was not conducive to conduct polling.
In Tamil Nadu, voting holds even more significance this year. With the deaths of AIADMK matriarch J Jayalalithaa and DMK chief M Karunanidhi, who have been the faces of the state’s politics for decades, both the parties face a huge leadership void. While the DMK is in better shape than the rudderless AIADMK, the leaders of both parties are finding it difficult to wield the kind of emotional connect with the public as ‘Kalaignar’ and ‘Amma’ did. Factionalism in the AIADMK has divided its party cadre. Its ally, the BJP, has tried hard to make inroads into the state, but has found few takers for its Hindutva politics. Trending Twitter hashtags like #GoBackModi and #GoBackSadistModi every time Prime Minister Narendra Modi has campaigned in the state, are perhaps on indication of how successful the BJP may be. But it still leaves us with the question — who will Tamil Nadu vote for? Also, what impact will the unsuccessful late-night raid on DMK candidate Kanimozhi have?
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In Karnataka, the Congress and the JD(S) managed to stitch together an alliance in Karnataka during the 2018 elections, but this hasn’t been free of trouble. As Karnataka votes on Thursday, it will be a high-stakes battle in the state with important candidates and constituencies in fray. Former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda is fighting from Tumkur while his grandsons Prajwal Revanna and Nikhil Kumaraswamy have been fielded from Hassan and Mandya respectively. Union Minister Sadananda Gowda is fighting from Bangalore North and senior Congress leaders Veerappa Moily will contest from Chikkaballapura and KH Muniyappa from Kolar.
Self-proclaimed bigot and the youngest BJP candidate Tejasvi Surya is trying his luck from Bangalore South. Actor Prakash Raj, a vocal critic of the BJP, is contesting from Bangalore Central as an independent candidate.
In Maharashtra, while the BJP is trying to hold on to as many seats as it can (it won 8 of the 10 seats going to polls in 2014), the Congress is trying to come back to power. One of the most interesting fights will be in Nanded, which the Congress managed to win even during the 2014 Modi wave. Prominent candidates in the fray are former chief ministers Ashok Chavan and Sushilkumar Shinde of the Congress, who are contesting from Nanded and Solapur seats, respectively.
Beed has the highest number of contestants at 36 while 10 candidates are contesting from Latur. The home constituency of late BJP leader Gopinath Munde, his daughter Pritam is seeking another term. She is facing Bajrang Sonawane of the NCP.
In Uttar Pradesh, which sends the highest number of lawmakers to Parliament, Nagina, Amroha, Bulandshahr, Aligarh, Hathras, Mathura and Agra will go to polls. One candidate everyone will be interested in will be sitting Mathura MP Hema Malini, who is seeking another term. The actor-turned politician, who has claimed that she has done a lot of work for her constituency (except she can’t remember what exactly it was), was recently trolled on Twitter for her insensitive remarks.
In Jammu and Kashmir, Srinagar and Uddhampur will go to polls.
In Bihar, 86.01 lakh voters will cast their votes across Bhagalpur, Banka, Kishanganj, Katihar and Purnea Lok Sabha constituencies. Purnea MP Santosh Kumar Kushwaha of the JD(U) is in a straight fight with Uday Singh of the Congress. Another major candidate is former Union minister Tariq Anwar who is seeking to retain Katihar as a Congress nominee. He had won the seat on an NCP ticket five years ago.
In Banka, RJD MP Jayaprakash Narayan Yadav faces a three-cornered contest with JD(U)’s Giridhari Yadav and former MP Putul Kumari, who has thrown her hat in the ring as an Independent.
Meanwhile, as we wait to see what happens in the second phase here’s what you need to know if you are voting today:
