Moderate Polling in 3rd phase Lok Sabha Elections

New Delhi: Polling in the third phase of elections to Lok Sabha began on a moderate note on Thursday during which the fate of prominent leaders such as Sonia Gandhi, L K Advani and H D Deve Gowda will be decided.

Voting began this morning in 107 constituencies spread across nine states and two union territories in the third round of the five-phased elections and would end at 1700 hrs.

A total of 1,567 candidates, including 101 women, are fighting for 107 seats in this phase. Polling is also underway for the 32-member Sikkim legislative Assembly.

Over 14.4 crore voters are eligible to exercise their franchise across 1.65 lakh booths, where ballots would be cast electronically.

While Congress president Sonia Gandhi is seeking re-election from Rae Bareli, one of the traditional constituencies of the Nehru-Gandhi family, Advani, the BJP's prime ministerial candidate, is bidding to hold on to the Gandhinagar seat as he has done in every election since 1991.

Prominent candidates in the fray in the third phase include former prime minister H D Deve Gowda, JD-U chief Sharad Yadav, Congress' Milind Deora, Priya Dutt and Jyotiraditya Scindia and former Karnataka chief minister S Bangarappa.

Tight security arrangements have been put in place to thwart any untoward incident.

Polling for 26 Lok Sabha seats in Gujarat will be completed at one go. Besides Gujarat, polling will be held in 16 seats in Madhya Pradesh, 15 in Uttar Pradesh, 14 in West Bengal, 11 each in Bihar and Karnataka, 10 in Maharashtra and one each in Jammu and Kashmir, Sikkim, Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu.

UP Chief Minister Mayawati was among the early voters who cast their ballots in the third phase of polls.

Accompanied by senior BSP leader Satish Chandra Mishra and party candidate from Lucknow Akhilesh Das Gupta, Mayawati cast her vote at Lucknow's Montessori College.

Sikkim has 32 assembly seats, of which one is reserved for the Sangha monks, who number 3,058.

The results will be out on May 16. The five-round general elections began on April 16 and so far elections have been completed to 265 Lok Sabha seats of the 545-member lower house of Parliament.

Elections are held to only 543 seats, as two members are nominated from the Anglo-Indian community.

This news published by www.zeenews.com