The Election Fee (EC) on Saturday introduced bypolls to the Mainpuri Lok Sabha seat in Uttar Pradesh, which fell vacant following the dying of Samajwadi Social gathering founder Mulayam Singh Yadav, together with 5 meeting constituencies in as many states on December 5.
Meeting constituencies going for the bypolls are Rampur (Uttar Pradesh), Padampur (Odisha), Sardarshahar (Rajasthan), Kurhani (Bihar) and Bhanupratappur (Chhattisgarh), stated the EC. Of those, the Bhanupratappur seat is reserved for Scheduled Tribes (ST).
The counting of votes will probably be held on December 8 to coincide with the outcomes of the Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh meeting elections. Whereas voting for Himachal Pradesh meeting polls will probably be held on November 12, Gujarat will see polling in two phases on December 1 and 5.
“The fee has determined to make use of EVMs (digital voting machines) and VVPATs (voter verifiable paper audit trails) within the by-elections throughout all of the polling stations,” the ballot panel stated in an announcement. “Sufficient numbers of EVMs and VVPATs have been made obtainable and all steps have been taken to make sure that the polls are performed easily with the assistance of those machines.”
Bypoll to the Mainpuri parliamentary seat was necessitated after SP patron Mulayam Singh Yadav, a seven-term Lok Sabha MP, handed away on October 10 following extended sickness.
SP chief Azam Khan’s disqualification after he was convicted and sentenced to three-year imprisonment in a 2019 case of hate speech necessitated bypoll to Rampur meeting seat in Uttar Pradesh.
In Rajasthan, Sardarshahar meeting seat fell vacant after the dying of Congress legislator Bhanwar Lal Sharma (77) on October 9.
Bypoll to the Kurhani seat in Bihar’s Muzaffarpur district was necessitated after the disqualification of Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) legislator Anil Sahni, who has been convicted and sentenced to a few years in jail in a case of fraud probed by CBI.
The final date for submitting of nominations is November 17 whereas candidates can withdraw their nominations until November 21, the EC stated.