Five Ola, Uber cabs seized for violating model code of conduct in UP

EC team impounds cars for hosting election publicity material and image of a political party without permission; state sees 4,000 cases of code breach and over 1,500 FIRs

The Election Commission (EC) has seized five commercial taxis attached with cab aggregators Ola and Uber in Lucknow for violation of the model code of conduct (MCC), with the 2019 Lok Sabha polls underway.

A private or commercial vehicle is prohibited from displaying any election related publicity material without prior permission of the EC/district election officer.

Acting on a tipoff, the EC team found five taxis prominently displaying election publicity material and image of a political party. On inquiry, their drivers could not produce any permission or authorisation for the same and hence were impounded by the EC team, a district election official told Business Standard.

Meanwhile, nearly six million posters, graffiti, wall writings, banners etc had either been removed or covered under the MCC at public and private places across Uttar Pradesh since the model code came into force on March 10, after the declaration of the polling schedule.

At the same time, about 4,000 cases pertaining to the violation of the MCC with regards to vehicles, public meeting, loudspeaker, inflammatory speeches etc had come to light, wherein more than 1,560 police first information reports (FIR) were lodged.

According to UP Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) L Venkateshwarlu, under the ongoing campaign to ensuring free and fair elections, authorities had impounded more than 7 tonnes of explosives and cancelled the arms license of 1,000 people in the state.

Nearly 0.9 million licensed arms had been deposited with the district authorities across the state for maintaining law and order in the election season. Restraint order had been issued against over 2.1 million people and non-bailable warrants executed against 32,000 individuals so far for ensuring free and fair elections.

Unaccounted cash worth almost Rs 44 crore had been recovered, while the excise and narcotics departments in UP had impounded 1.6 million litres of illicit liquor worth Rs 43 crore and Rs 24 crore worth of psychotropic substance respectively. Precious metals, including gold and silver, worth Rs 72 crore had also been recovered.

Meanwhile, 39 Lok Sabha constituencies in UP have already witnessed polling in the first 4 phases and the remaining 41 constituencies would witness polling in 3 phases on May 6, 12 and 19, before the counting takes place on May 23.

The polling in UP, which accounts for the maximum number of 80 seats, is scheduled in seven phases -- April 11, 18, 23, 29, May 6, 12 and 19.

The state has more than 144 million eligible voters, of which 77.9 million are males, 66.1 million females and 8,374 are from the third gender.  A total of 91,709 polling centres and 163,331 polling booths would be set up. The seven phases would witness voting in 8, 8, 10, 13, 14, 14 and 13 constituencies respectively spread across 75 districts in UP.