Elections 2019: Shiela Dikshit, Virat Kohli among early morning voters

Pic/ANI

Early voters in the sixth phase of Lok Sabha polls included a number of heavyweight candidates and political leaders with the likes of Sheila Dikshit, Ajay Maken, Gautam Gambhir, and Virat Kohli exercising their franchise.

With votes being cast for all the seven seats in Delhi and 52 parliamentary constituencies across 6 states, politicians urged voters to turn out in large numbers.

Ajay Maken, a Congress candidate from New Delhi constituency against BJP's Meenakshi Lekhi, said that the contest in the national capital is not triangular as AAP is not even in the fray. "I am confident that Congress will win all the seven seats in Delhi. The fight is between Congress and BJP and I don't think that the contest is triangular. These elections are national elections and are fought on national issues," Maken said after casting his vote.

Also read: Elections 2019: Voting begins for penultimate phase Lok Sabha polls

Newly-minted BJP leader Gautam Gambhir cast his vote at a polling booth in Delhi's Old Rajinder Nagar area. The former cricketer is fielded against AAP's Atishi and Congress's Arvinder Singh Lovely from East Delhi.

His Congress opponent, after casting his vote, said Atishi and Gambhir did not reach out to people as they were busy fighting each other. "I reached out to the people, while Atishi and Gambhir are indulged in a fight against each other and have not gone to the people. People are also thinking that those who do not come to them before elections will certainly not work after winning."

BJP's contestant from Madhya Pradesh's Bhopal, Pragya Singh Thakur, cast her vote at a booth in the constituency. The first timer, who is up against Digvijaya Singh of Congress, urged voters to turn up for polling as she spoke to media.

Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia expressed hope that UPA will get a full majority and termed the present NDA as "incompetent". "On this festival of democracy, I request every one to take part. I am positive that people will vote for us based on our manifesto and ideology and UPA will get a full majority. A development driven UPA government will replace the incompetent NDA government," said Scindia, the Congress candidate from Guna.

Uttar Pradesh Minister Sidharth Nath Singh voted at a booth in Prayagraj and appealed to people to step out of their houses."I appeal all to not remain confident within their home but rather step out and cast their vote. I also request all to cast vote in the name of the nation," the BJP leader said.

Indian cricket team's captain Virat Kohli queued up at a booth set up in Gurugram's Pinecrest School. Dressed in a pastel t-shirt, the youth icon made an important appeal, "I would request all to cast their vote, all should come to their respective polling booths and must exercise their right to vote," he said.

Polling is being held on eight seats in Bihar, all ten seats in Haryana, eight in Madhya Pradesh, 14 in Uttar Pradesh, eight in West Bengal and four in Jharkhand.

Other prominent faces in this round are Akhilesh Yadav, Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Harsh Vardhan and Radha Mohan Singh.

Re-polling is being conducted at booth number 116 in West Bengal's Barrackpore parliamentary constituency and station number 110 in Arambag Lok Sabha seat, along with one polling station each in Puducherry and Tripura.

President Ram Nath Kovind, the first citizen of the country, exercised his franchise at a voting booth in Rashtrapati Bhavan on Sunday. Kovind along with his wife Savita cast his vote at the booth.
This is the first time that Kovind has exercised his voting right after taking over as the President of India in July 2017.

The seventh and last phase of national elections will take place on 19 and counting of votes will take place on May 23.

A total of 13,819 polling stations have been set up at 2,700 locations in Delhi, with one model polling station in each of the 70 assembly segments. As many as 523 polling locations have been identified as critical and 60,000 personnel, including those of the Delhi Police, Home Guards and paramilitary, will be on their toes to ensure there is no untoward incident.

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Edited by mid-day online desk with inputs from Agencies