Bhopal, May 19 (UNI) Approximately 50 per cent voting was recorded in the first six hours as exercise of franchise continued amid tight security on Sunday in Indore, Dewas, Ujjain, Dhar, Khandwa, Khargone, Mandsaur and tribal-dominated Ratlam parliamentary constituencies of Madhya Pradesh’s Malwa and Nimar regions under the state’s fourth and final phase of these Lok Sabha polls.
The area-wise break-up is Indore about 38 per cent, Dewas 52, Ujjain 47, Dhar 48, Khandwa 45, Khargone 46, Mandsaur 51 and Ratlam 47. Long queues are being observed in rural areas. Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) workers and Congress counterparts rained lathis on one another outside Jhabua District’s Umarkot Polling Centre but intervention by law enforcement authorities restored normalcy.
“A total 94 ballot units, 91 control units and 260 Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail machines were replaced during mock polls. Officials are pacifying villagers at one place in Agar Malwa District and five in Mandsaur after boycott reports were received. An employee died following cardiac arrest in Dhar this morning and a presiding officer perished last night in Shajapur,” state Chief Electoral Officer VL Kantha Rao told the press.
The voting timings are 0700-1800 hrs. A total 82 candidates are in the arena and the 1,49,13,890-strong electorate includes more than 72.86 lakh women. The break-up of nominees is Indore 20, Dewas six, Ujjain nine, Dhar seven, Khandwa 11, Khargone seven, Mandsaur 13 and Ratlam nine. Polling centres number 18,411.
The fortunes of several stalwarts of the BJP and the Congress are being sealed in electronic voting machines. In Khandwa, the BJP’s erstwhile state president and ‘defending’ MP Nand Kumar Singh Chauhan is on collision course with his Congress parallel and former central minister Arun Yadav who was vanquished in this very area in 2014. Mandsaur has youthful ex-MP Meenakshi Natrajan (Cong) contesting against MP Sudhir Gupta (BJP); Ratlam is seeing its MP and erstwhile Union minister Kantilal Bhuria (Cong) locked in combat against Mr Guman Singh Damor (BJP). Saffron citadel Indore is the cynosure of all eyes as outgoing Lok Sabha Speaker and eight-time MP Sumitra Mahajan (BJP) has been representing it without interval since 1989 but is not contesting this time and the saffron camp reposed faith in Mr Shankar Lalwani who is in an eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation with Mr Pankaj Sanghvi (Congress). In nearby Dhar, former MP Chhatar Singh (BJP) is trying his luck against Mr Dinesh Girwal (Cong). In Dewas, ex-judge Mahendra Solanki (BJP) is fighting folk artiste Padma Shri Prahlad Singh Tipaniya (Cong); in adjoining Ujjain erstwhile legislator Anil Firojiya (BJP) is up against Mr Baburam Malviya (Cong) and in Khargone Mr Gajendra Patel (BJP) is locking horns with Dr Govind Mujalda (Cong).
About 81,000 officials are on duty. For security, 83 companies of central force and 49 of the State Armed Force have been deployed. A total of 56,092 police personnel are in action along with the Home Guard and special police officers. As many as 3,636 critical centres were identified; more than 3,000 booths are being monitored through webcasting / closed-circuit television. Global Positioning systems have been installed in vehicles of all sector officers and polling parties.
Dewas and Ujjain are reserved for Scheduled Castes; Ratlam, Dhar and Khargone for Scheduled Tribes. The state has 29 parliamentary constituencies – six completed polling on April 29, seven on May 6 and eight on May 12.
UNI Team-AC