All preparations have been completed for the polling for first phase of 390 urban local body polls, including 10 Municipal Corporations, 104 Nagar Palika Parishads and 275 Nagar Panchayats covering 37 districts in nine divisions of Uttar Pradesh on Thursday, a State Election Commission spokesman said here.
The spokesman said that the polling parties were dispatched for the polling to be held at 23,626 polling booths set up in 7,368 polling centers in the first phase on Wednesday. He said that total 2,40,07643 voters, including 1,27,70,963 male and 1,12,36,680 female voters are eligible to vote for 7,593 posts, including 10 of mayor, 103 of chairperson of Nagar Palika Parishad and 275 posts of chairpersons of Nagar Panchayats.
Polling in ten Municipal corporations would be done by using Electronic Voting Machines(EVM) while
ballot paper would be used in the rest of the Municipal corporations.
He said that a total 44,232 candidates are in the fray. He said that 85 candidates, including 10 corporators, one chairperson each of Nagar Palika Parishad and Nagar Panchayat and 73 members have already been elected unopposed.
The spokesman said that 9 divisions covered in this phase include Saharanpur, Moradabad, Agra, Jhansi, Prayagraj, Lucknow, Gorakhpur, Varanasi and Devipatan.
Districts to be covered in the first phase include Shamli, Muzaffarnagar, Saharanpur, Bijnor, Amroha, Moradabad, Rampur, Sambhal, Agra, Firozabad, Mathura Mainpuri, Jhansi, Jalaun, Lalitpur Kaushambi, Prayagraj, Fatehpur, Pratapgarh, Unnao, Hardoi, Lucknow, Rae Bareli, Sitapur, Lakhimpur Kheri, Gonda, Bahraich, Balrampur Shravasti, Gorakhpur, Deoria, Maharajganj Kushinagar, Ghazipur, Varanasi, Chandauli and Jaunpur, he said.
Meanwhile, a police spokesman said that tight security arrangements have been made to ensure fair and peaceful polling. “Total 19,880 Inspectors and Sub-Inspector along with 1,01,477 head constables and constables and 47,985 home guards have been deployed on poll duty,” he said.
The spokesman said that in addition to the police force 86 companies and two platoons of PAC and 35 companies of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) have also been deployed. “7,500 under trainee SI have also been deployed for the purpose of election training,” he said.
As the civic polls are being considered as a ‘semi-final’ before 2024 Lok Sabha elections, leaders of major political parties, including Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Samajwadi Party (SP) and Congress campaigned extensively on the last day of the campaign on Tuesday.
