UP third phase registers 12% polling in 2 hours

An average of 12 per cent voting has been recorded in the first two hours of polling in the third phase of the Uttar Pradesh assembly election on Sunday, Election Commission (EC) officials said.

The highest voter turnout so far of 12 per cent has been reported from Mainpuri district, a Samajwadi Party (SP) stronghold.

A total of 11 per cent voting has been recorded in the first two hours in Sitapur, 11.65 per cent in Kannauj, which is the parliamentary constituency of Dimple Yadav, wife of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, and 10 per cent in Farukkhabad and Auraiyya.

Slow voter turnout has been reported from Kanpur city where in the first two hours only 7.71 per cent balloting was witnessed.

Ram Gopal Yadav, Samajwadi Party (SP) General Secretary, and Abhayram Yadav, the brother of Mulayam Singh Yadav, cast their votes in Saifai in Etawah.

Aparna Yadav, the daughter-in-law of Mulayam Singh Yadav, voted in Lucknow Cantt from where she is pitted against Bharatiya Janata Party's Rita Bahuguna Joshi.

Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati also cast her vote here and so did Pankaj Singh, son of Home Minister Rajnath Singh.

Prominent persons who voted in the state capital included Rita Bahuguna Joshi, former state Congress President and currently the BJP candidate from Lucknow Cantt seat.

As many as 826 candidates are in the fray whose fate would be decided by 2.41 crore voters.

Prominent districts where polling is underway include Lucknow, Kanpur, Etawah, Kannauj, Etah and Mainpuri.

In this round, all eyes are set on major personalities such as former PWD Minister Shivpal Singh Yadav, Aparna Yadav, Akhilesh Yadav's cousin Anurag Yadav, Rita Bahuguna Joshi, ministers Abhishek Mishra, Arvind Singh 'Gop', Fareed Mehmood Kidwai and BJP's Ashutosh Tandon, Brajesh Pathak and BSP's Nakul Dubey.

--IANS

md/py/