Rajasthan polls: Big battle between Ashok Gehlot, Vasundhara Raje

Jaipur: The Congress and the BJP are locked in a straight contest in Rajasthan, where polling is underway for 199 constituencies that will seal the fate of Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and state BJP chief Vasundhara Raje. Counting of votes will take place on December 8.

Polling in Churu constituency has been postponed to December 13 following the death of BSP candidate Jagdish Meghwal. (Constituencies)

Mr Gehlot, who is seeking a second consecutive term, is contesting from his home turf of Sardarpura seat in Jodhpur district.

His opponent and former chief minister, Vasundhara Raje, is leading her party's campaign to wrest power from the Congress. It's a crucial election for Ms Raje - fighting from the Jhalarapatan seat in Hadauti region - who faced a major revolt after the party, under her leadership, lost narrowly to Congress in 2008 and then in the parliamentary elections in 2009.

Other prominent candidates in the fray include state Congress president Chandrabhan, Gujjar leader Prahlad Gunjal and Meena community leader Kirori Lal Meena.

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Strong security arrangements are in place for the polling which began at 8 am at over 40,000 polling stations across the state with over four crore people exercising their franchise to elect 2,087 candidates. (Full coverage)

Over 10,000 polling stations have been declared sensitive and security measures have been beefed up in these areas.

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In all, over 1.19 lakh security personnel have been deployed in the state to conduct peaceful and fair elections.

In the outgoing house, Congress holds 102 seats and the Bharatiya Janata Party has 79. (Statistics for previous polls)

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