Haryana assembly elections: Polling begins for 90 Assembly seats

Polling for all the 90 Assembly seats in Haryana began on Saturday morning amid tight security arrangements officials said reported news agency PTIThe fate of Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini Congress leaders Bhupinder Singh Hooda and Vinesh Phogat besides the JJPs Dushyant Chautala and 1027 other candidates will be decided in the Haryana assembly elections in which more than two crore people are eligible to voteThe ruling Bharatiya Janata Party BJP is eyeing a hattrick of Haryana assembly elections wins in the state while the Congress is hoping to return to power after 10 yearsThe counting of votes will be taken up on October 8The voting is being held from 7 am 6 pmHaryanas Chief Electoral Officer CEO Pankaj Agarwal had earlier said 20354350 voters including 8821 centurions are eligible to exercise their franchise reported PTIA total of 1031 candidates are contesting the election including 101 women and 464 Independent nomineesA total of 20632 polling booths have been set up Agarwal had saidBesides the BJP and the Congress the key contesting parties are the Aam Aadmi PArty AAP and the INLDBSP and JJPAzad Samaj Party alliancesIn the last Haryana assembly elections in 2019 the BJP had won 40 seats the Congress 31 and the Jannayak Janta Party JJP 10The Congress has left the Bhiwani seat for its INDIA bloc partner CPIM while the BJP is not contesting the Sirsa seat from where Haryana Lokhit Party chief Gopal Kanda is seeking reelectionMost seats are likely to see a direct fight between the BJP and the CongressProminent among those in the fray are Chief Minister Saini from Ladwa Leader of Opposition B S Hooda Garhi SamplaKiloi Indian National Lok Dals INLD Abhay Singh Chautala Ellenabad JJPs Dushyant Chautala Uchana Kalan BJPs Anil Vij Ambala Cantonment Captain Abhimanyu Narnaund and O P Dhankar Badli AAPs Anurag Dhanda Kalayat and Congresss Phogat a former wrestler from Julana reported PTIFrom Tosham former MP Shruti Choudhry of the BJP and Anirudh Chaudhary both cousins are contestingFrom Dabwali Devi Lals grandson Aditya Devi Lal an INLD candidate is taking on the JJPs Digvijay Singh Chautala the great grandson of the former deputy prime ministerThe BJP has fielded former chief minister late Bhajan Lals grandson Bhavya Bishnoi from Adampur in Hisar while its nominee from Ateli in Mahendragarh is Arti Rao whose father Rao Inderjit Singh is a Union minister reported PTIAmong the independent candidates are Savitri Jindal Hisar Ranjit Chautala Rania and Chitra Sarwara Ambala CantonmentTaking on Dushyant Chautala from Uchana is the Congresss Brijendra Singh son of former Union minister Birender SinghA few rebels from both the Congress and the BJP are also in the frayDirector General of Police DGP Shatrujeet Kapur on Friday said the Haryana Police is fully prepared to ensure a free fair and peaceful conduct of the election reported PTINearly 30000 police personnel and 225 paramilitary companies have been deployed An adequate number of home guard personnel have also been deployed reported PTIAdequate police presence will be maintained at the polling booths and other locations More than 3616 polling booths have been classified as sensitive and 145 deemed vulnerable necessitating additional security measures reported PTITo maintain law and order and ensure compliance with the Model Code of Conduct the state has also formed 516 flying squads 469 staticsurveillance teams and 32 quickresponse teams Additionally 1156 patrolling parties are actively monitoring the situation the DGP said reported PTIAgarwal said of the total voters 10775957 are men 9577926 are women and 467 belong to the third gender reported PTIThere are 524514 voters aged between 18 and 19 years and 149142 differentlyabled voters of whom 93545 are male 55591 are female and six belong to the third gender reported PTIA total of 231093 voters are aged above 85 years comprising 89940 males and 141153 females reported PTIThere are 8821 voters aged over 100 years including 3283 males and 5538 females The total number of service voters is 109217 104426 males and 4791 females reported PTIThe voter turnout recorded in the 2019 Assembly polls was around 68 per centA total of 144 polling stations have been designated as model ones Besides 115 polling stations will be entirely managed by women staff 114 by young government employees and 87 by differentlyabled employeesWebcasting will be conducted at all the polling stations on election day Agarwal had said earlierThe CEO had said including reserved units a total of 27866 electronic voting machines ballot units will be used in this electionIn 2019 the BJP formed the government with the support of the JJP while most of the Independent MLAs had also extended support to the saffron party However the JJPs postpoll tieup with the BJP ended after the latter replaced Manohar Lal Khattar with Saini as the chief minister in MarchWith inputs from PTI