The campaigning for the Anantnag-Rajouri Lok Sabha seat ended on Thursday evening with candidates making last ditch efforts to woo the voters.
The fate of 20 candidates will be decided by over 18.36 lakh voters on May 25.
The constituency is now locked in a contest where the prominent players are Peoples Democratic Party’s president Mehbooba Mufti , National Conference’s influential Gujjar leader Mian Altaf and Apni Party’s Zaffar Manhas.
The Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP) headed by former chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad has fielded Mohammad Saleem Parray from the seat.
All the major parties held rallies and meetings on the last day of campaigning today.
The Anantnag- Rajouri Lok Sabha seat has 18 assembly segments – 11 in the Kashmir region’s Shopian, Kulgam, and Anantnag districts and 7 in Jammu’s Poonch and Rajouri districts across the Pir Panjal range.
Due to the recent attacks in Poonch-Rajouri belt and Kashmir’s Shopian and Pahalgam, security has been beefed up for the polls.
According to the figures provided by the office of the Chief Electoral Officer, there are 18,36,576 voters which included 9,33,647 male and 9,02,902 female voters and 27 third gender voters.
Around 17,967 persons with disability and 540 persons above the age of 100 years will cast their ballots.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) has set up 2,338 polling stations across the Anantnag- Rajouri Parliamentary Constituency.
An official spokesman said more than 9,000 polling staff, including reserve will be deployed on duty.
There are 19 Border Polling Stations in the districts of Rajouri and Poonch.
All the polling stations in Anantnag- Rajouri will have CCTV cameras for live webcasting to control rooms established at the District and CEO office.
