India News | Campaigning Ends for Final Phase of Urban Local Body Polls in UP

Lucknow, May 9 (PTI) Campaigning for the final phase of the urban local body elections in Uttar Pradesh ended on Tuesday evening with the main rivals BJP and Samajwadi Party leaders criss-crossing the poll-bound areas to gain an upper hand in the municipalities ahead of the crucial Parliamentary elections next year.

According to the State Election Commission (SEC), voting will take place in 38 districts including Meerut, Ghaziabad, Shahjahanpur, Bareilly, Aligarh, Kanpur and Ayodhya on May 11.

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Shahjahanpur will vote to elect its first mayor.

Meerut and Aligarh had BSP mayors in 2017 while the BJP ruled the rest.

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Over 1.92 crore voters will cast their votes to elect their representatives in the second phase, officials said, adding the elections are being held on party symbols.

Voting will be held from 7.00 am to 6.00 pm on Thursday.

The first phase of voting was held on May 4.

Counting of votes for both the legs will take place on May 13.

The polls are considered important as political parties will try to showcase their strength before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls in the state, which sends the maximum 80 MPs to Lok Sabha.

As many as 39,146 candidates are in the fray in the second round for 6,929 posts, which include 7 mayors and 581 corporators. Apart from this, voting will be held to elect 95 chairpersons and 2,520 members of nagar palika parishads, and 267 chairpersons and 3,459 members of various nagar panchayats.

The SEC said 77 representatives including 9 corporators in this round have been elected unopposed.

Addressing an election rally in Kanpur on Tuesday, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said, "Those who were responsible for riots and curfews in Kanpur and played with people's faith in the past are today the candidates of the Samajwadi Party. The kind of remarks they made on women and the holy epic 'Ramayan' are not hidden from anyone."

"This election is not about hatred and not about personal comments. This is the election to make your city a smart city, a safe city and one which will have all the basic facilities," he said.

Targeting the SP in Ayodhya on Monday, Adityanath referred to the incidents of firing on 'kar sevaks' in 1990, when the SP led by Mulayam Singh Yadav was in power. He said a "wrong message" would go out if those who opened fire at 'kar sevaks' get votes in the city.

Campaigning in Bareilly on Monday, Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya said both the SP and the BSP were "in the ICU" and voters were not willing to provide "oxygen" to them.

Union minister Smriti Irani campaigned in Amethi. She said the "double-engine" government of the BJP has boosted the pace of development and asked voters to support BJP for "unhindered development".

From the opposition camp, Mainpuri MP Dimple Yadav and Shivpal Yadav extended a helping hand to SP president Akhilesh Yadav, who had been campaigning for the party nominees.

Dimple Yadav held a roadshow in Kanpur Monday. She said people have started realising that it was only her party which could truly work for UP's development. She also said people will no longer be misled by the BJP.

Rashtriya Lok Dal chief Jayant Chaudhary did not campaign for party candidates in the ongoing polls.

Mayawati also did not show up anywhere and so did Congress top leaders like Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who were busy with the Karnataka Assembly polls.

According to the final list of reserved seats, the mayor seat in Agra has been reserved for SC (female), Jhansi for SC, Shahjahanpur and Firozabad for OBC (female), Saharanpur and Meerut for OBC, and Lucknow, Kanpur and Ghaziabad have been reserved for women.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)