Electioneering for Sitarganj by-election ends

On the last day of campaigning, Bahuguna along with his sister and Uttar Pradesh PCC president Rita Bahuguna Joshi and Uttarakhand Congress president Yashpal Arya organised a road show to drum up support in his favour.

Bahuguna and Arya have been camping in Sitarganj for the past few days to ensure a victory from the seat.

Uttarakhand Chief Election Officer Radha Raturi said the polling for the by-election would be held on July 8, while the counting of votes will take place on July 11.

In the by-election, Bahuguna is locked in a straight contest with BJP's Prakash Pant, who held the posts of cabinet ministers and Speaker of the assembly during the tenure of previous BJP governments.

Pant had lost the recent assembly election held earlier this year from Pithoragarh.

The Sitarganj seat fell vacant after former BJP MLA Kiran Mandal quit the seat in favour of Bahuguna "for the sake of development of his constituency".

Both the main political parties-- Congress and BJP relied only on the state leadership for campaigning.

For BJP, the campaigning was managed by Rajya Sabha MP and party's national vice president Bhagat Singh Koshiyari, state BJP president Bishan Singh Chufal and leader of the opposition Ajay Bhatt.

Bhatt said the main poll plank of the BJP is the "treachery" by Mandal, who resigned from the seat. "The people had voted for BJP and by resigning from the seat in favour of Congress for money, Mandal has done treachery," he said.

Nearly 1500 personnel including four companies of central paramilitary forces and three platoons of PAC have been deployed in the constituency for security purpose. Besides, a polling staff comprising nearly 600 people have also been put on duty on 116 polling booths, Raturi said.

Sitarganj constituency has an electorate of 91247, including 42447 women voters.