New Delhi: Three-way battle of ballots begins for 7 LS seats
Delhi, May 12 (UNI/IBNS) The Capital's 1.43 crore electors commenced exercising their franchise at 13,800 polling stations on Sunday for seven Lok Sabha constituencies of Delhi, in what is seen as a three-way contest between the newbie Aam Aadmi Party, Bharatiya Janata Party and Indian National Congress.
Polling in Chandni Chowk, East Delhi, New Delhi, North East Delhi, North West Delhi (SC), South Delhi and West Delhi - will go on till 1800 hours. Elaborate security is in place at every polling station across the national capital.
The electorate -- 7.8 crores male and 6.4 crore women -- will decide the fate of 164 candidates in the seven Parliamentary constituencies. In several polling booths across the national, voters had reached before 0700 hrs.
Early birds Delhi Metro train services on all lines started from 0400 hrs to enable the staff deployed on election duties to reach their polling stations. The trains going from Dwarka Sector 21 towards Vaishali started operations at 0430 hrs.
The star-studded line-up of contestants include three-time Delhi Chief Minister and Congress leader Sheila Dikshit and old Congress war horse and four-time Lok Sabha MP Jai Prakash Aggarwal, BJP leader and Union Minister Harsh Vardhan, Delhi BJP president Manoj Tiwari, seasoned Congress leader and former Union Minister Ajay Maken, BJP MPs Meenakshi Lekhi and Ramesh Bidhuri.
New faces among the fresh faces, Congress has fielded boxing champion and Olympian Vijender Singh while the AAP has fielded the youthful party spokesman Raghav Chadha. A touch of glamour has been lent by the BJP candidates Gautam Gambhir, a cricketer-turned-politician and Sufi singer Hansraj Hans.
While BJP's main poll plank was the performance of the National Democratic Alliance government during the past five years at the Centre and mass appeal of Narendra Modi, the Congress tried to woo voters by its track record of 15 year rule in Delhi.
AAP raised full statehood for Delhi and sealing drive, among other issues.
Braving a hot summer, Delhi which is going to the polls in the sixth phase of 2019 general elections, witnessed an intense and aggressive campaign by the BJP, Congress and AAP with each one of them pulling out all stops to lure voters.
If Prime Minister Narendra Modi was the star campaigner for the BJP, it was Congress president Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra who drummed up support for their party. For the ruling AAP,, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal stepped up . In the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP had won all the seven seats. Counting of votes of the Lok Sabha elections 2019 will be taken up on May 23, Thursday.
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