Uttar Pradesh By-elections: Polling today in high-stake constituencies

Lucknow: The high-stake Uttar Pradesh constituencies of Kairana and Noorpur are all set to lock up the fate of the by-election candidates as the UPiites started giving their votes amid scorching heatwaves.

Voting for the Kairana parliamentary seat and Noorpur assembly constituency began under tight security at 7 am on Monday and will continue till 6 pm.

In all there are 160,962,8 voters in Kairana of which 873,120 men, 736,431 women and 77 of the third gender while in Noorpur there are 306,226 voters here of which are men, 141,924 women and 10 this gender voters.

Looking at the current scenario of politics in the entire country, these polls are also being termed as 'Bjp vs united opposition' where the major parties are Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party,Rashtriya Lok Dal and Congress joining hands against Bharatiya Janata Party.

It is to be mentioned that the Congress and the BSP has decided not field their candidates and support the opposition in the elections. The Aam Aadmi Party has also stated that it will extend support to the RLD.

Also Read: Punjab begins voting for assembly bypoll in scorching heat

Why these polls?

These two constituencies are going under polls to fill the vacant seats of Lok Sabha and UP Vidhan Sabha. Kairana polls are being conducted in the wake of the seat that was left vacant after the death of Member or Parliament from BJP Hukum Singh. Here, BJP has fielded Singh's daughter Mriganka Singh for the post while Tabassum Hasan has been named by the RLD as their candidate.

The Noorpur polls are being conducted to fill the seat of Lokendra Singh which was left vacant after his sudden demise in an accident. BJP candidate Avani Singh is contesting the elections in this constituency against Samajwadi party's Naish-ul-Hasan.

These elections could be called as the litmus test for the BJ[P as in the by-polls, held in Gorakhpur and Phulpur, teh saffron party lost to the SP-BSP alliance and the recent Karnataka assembly polls have also been a major twist in BJP's winning story.

It is worth mentioning that a total of 2,651 EVM control units, 2,651 ballot units and 2,596 VVPAT's are being used in the polling process.