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Nearly eight crore voters on Monday will decide the fate of several political bigwigs, including Congress chief Rahul Gandhi and Union Ministers Rajnath Singh and Smriti Irani, with polling underway in Phase 5 of the Lok Sabha elections.
Fourteen seats in Uttar Pradesh, 12 in Rajasthan, seven each in West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh, five in Bihar and four in Jharkhand will go to polls, in addition to Ladakh and Anantnag constituencies in Jammu and Kashmir. This is the first election in Ladakh division following its split from the Kashmir division earlier this year.
The stakes are high for the ruling BJP and its allies as it had swept 40 of these seats in 2014, leaving just two for the Congress and the rest for other opposition parties such as the Trinamool Congress (seven). This is an important phase for BJP in Uttar Pradesh since it had won 12 of the 14 seats in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. The Congress won only Rae Bareli and Amethi — the only two constituencies where the party succeeded out of the 80 seats in the state.
Follow Lok Sabha Elections Phase V LIVE UPDATES here.
This phase will see voting in the following high-profile seats:
In Uttar Pradesh, both Rae Bareli and Amethi — constituencies which are traditional strongholds of Congress — will see a riveting contest, with the SP-BSP alliance lending their support to the party.
Sitting MP Rahul Gandhi is seeking to defend his turf and win the Amethi seat for the fourth time. His main challenger is Union Minister Smriti Irani, who brought down Rahul’s victory margin to just over a lakh in 2014.
Amethi has seen an intense campaign by both the BJP and Congress, with the Grand Old Party accusing the former of trying to bribe voters. The BJP, on the other hand, flagged Congress’s dynastic politics as the bane of Amethi and sought to woo locals with development.
In Rae Bareli, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi is pitted against former Congress leader Dinesh Pratap Singh, who switched to the BJP recently.
Former Union minister and Congress candidate Jitin Prasada is contesting from Dhaurahra against former Chambal brigand Malkhan Singh. Malkhan Singh has been fielded by Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party-Lohia, floated by Shivpal Yadav.
Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh is seeking re-election from Lucknow and will be up against new Samajwadi party entrant and Shatrughan Sinha’s wife Poonam and Congress’ Pramod Krishnam.
In Jharkhand, two former chief ministers Babulal Marandi, the leader of Jharkhand Vikas Morcha (Prajatantrik), and Arjun Munda of the BJP are contesting from the Koderma and Khunti seats, respectively, while Union Minister of State for Civil Aviation Jayant Sinha is seeking re-election from Hazaribag.
Former Railway minister and TMC candidate Dinesh Trivedi is fighting against BJP’s Arjun Singh and Gargi Chatterjee of CPM from Barrackpore in West Bengal. Arjun Singh, a four-time TMC MLA, had switched to BJP earlier this year.
In Rajasthan, the Jaipur Rural seat will see former Olympians Rajyavardhan Rathore (BJP) and Krishna Poonia (Congress) locking horns. In Bikaner, Union minister Arjun Ram Meghwal (BJP) is facing a tough fight from his cousin and Congress candidate Madangopal Meghwal, a former IPS officer.
