Lok Sabha elections Phase 2: Voting underway
Voting for the second phase of the Lok Sabha elections began on Friday morning. 88 constituencies across 12 states and a union territory, including Congress stalwart Rahul Gandhi’s Wayanad, are voting to choose their representatives to the lower house of the parliament.
Voting in all 20 seats in Kerala started at 7 am today. Polling in 14 seats in Karnataka, 13 seats in Rajasthan, 8 seats each in Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, 6 seats in Madhya Pradesh, 5 seats each in Assam and Bihar, 3 seats each in Chhattisgarh and West Bengal, and 1 seat each in Manipur, Tripura and Jammu and Kashmir, will also take place today.
89 seats were supposed to be polling in the second phase elections; however, voting in Madhya Pradesh’s Betul was rescheduled due to the death of the BSP candidate.
In total, 15.88 crore voters are eligible to exercise their fundamental right in the second phase of the Lok Sabha elections. 8.08 crore male voters, 7.8 crore female voters and 5,929 third gender electors are eligible to vote at 1.67 lakh polling stations.
These include 34.8 lakh first-time voters and 3.28 crore young voters in the age group of 20-29 years.
1202 candidates will try their luck in the second phase of the general elections, including 102 women and two people from the third gender category.
Political stalwarts like Rahul Gandhi, Shashi Tharoor, Union minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar, actor-turned-politician Arun Govil, Karnataka deputy chief minister DK Shivakumar’s brother DK Suresh (Cong), former Karnataka chief minister HD Kumaraswamy (JDS), BJP’s Hema Malini, Om Birla and Gajendra Singh Shekhawat are in the fray today.