Lucknow, Feb 11 (IANS): Polling got off to a good start in eastern Uttar Pradesh where 59 constituencies spread across nine districts are holding balloting Saturday in the second phase of the staggered assembly election in the country's most populous state.
Braving the cold morning breeze that swept large parts of the region, bordering Nepal, people made a beeline for polling booths. However, a bright sun brought respite and encouraged long queues at most polling centres.
According to state chief electoral officer Umesh Sinha, "The turnout of the first two hours of polling is estimated at about 8 percent, as against 5.5 percent during the corresponding period in the first phase on Feb 8."
He told IANS, "Unlike the first phase when rain and chill keep people indoors through larger part of the forenoon, I am quite hopeful of a huge turnout on a bright and sunny Saturday."
As many as 1.97 crore voters will decide the fate of 1,098 candidates in the fray for the second phase polling for 59 of Uttar Pradesh's 403 state assembly seats. Other than Gorakhpur, the districts going to poll today are Azamgarh, Ballia, Ghazipur, Maharajganj, Deoria, Mau, Sant Kabir Nagar and Kushinagar, where 20,426 polling stations with some 20,800 electrornic voting machines (EVM) were in place.
The phase is crucial for the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), which had bagged as many as 30 of the 59 seats in the last assembly election in 2007. While Samajwadi Party (SP) won 21 seats, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) got six and Congress trailed last with two seats here.
A number of leaders of different political parties are in fray, and prominent among them are assembly Speaker Sukhdeo Rajbhar, BJP state president Surya Pratap Shahi, BSP state chief Swami Prasad Maurya, dreaded mafia don turned politician Mukhtar Ansari as well as Peace Party president Ayub. Significantly, SP had fielded Aman Mani Tripathi, the son of jailed mafia-turned-politician Amarmani Tripathi, who is convicted for the murder of Hindi poetess Madhumita Shukla, his girlfriend.
A giant police force of over 1,20,000 cops including about 55,000 central para-military personnel and 10,000 personnel of the Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) was in place to maintain strict vigil in the crime prone, communally sensitive and poverty ridden vast expanse of Eastern Uttar Pradesh.