Elections 2019 Highlights: 57.33% Turnout Recorded For 14 Lok Sabha Seats In UP Today

The Chief Electoral Officer has said that an estimated 57.33 per cent turnout has been recorded for 14 Uttar Pradesh constituencies in the fifth phase of the Lok Sabha elections.

UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi is up against Congress turncoat and BJP candidate Dinesh Pratap Singh in Raebareli. The BJP is trying to project the polls in Raebareli -- one of the country's most high-profile constituencies, as a contest between ''parivarvaad'' (dynastic politics) of the Congress and development. Top BJP leaders, including party president Amit Shah, have campaigned for Dinesh Singh, a local strongman, who was chosen over Ajay Agarwal, a Supreme Court lawyer, who had unsuccessfully contested from the seat in in the 2014 general election. Mr Singh, who joined the BJP last year, dubbed the Congress a "private limited company" of the first family. "I quit the Congress because it was serving only the interests of one family and not the nation. It has become a private limited company of the Gandhis," Mr Singh was quoted by news agency PTI.

Nearly 23 per cent turnout was recorded today in the first four hours of polling in 14 Lok Sabha seats of UP where Union ministers Rajnath Singh and Smriti Irani, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Congress President Rahul Gandhi are in the fray. Among early voters in the state capital included Home Minister Singh, BSP supremo Mayawati, Deputy CM Dinesh Sharma, BSP General Secretary Satish Chandra Mishra, DGP OP Singh and Principal Secretary (Home) Arvind Kumar. Election officials said polling was going on smoothly, barring some complaints of EVM malfunctioning, which were attended to immediately.

Union minister Smriti Irani has accused the Congress of booth capturing in Amethi. She retweeted a video in which an elderly woman claimed that she was forcibly made to press the Congress button at a polling booth in Amethi. The tweet was posted after a BJP worker tweeted a video of an elderly woman who claimed that she was forced to vote for the Congress even though she had planned to press the button against the BJP's "lotus" symbol on the voting machine.

Uttar Pradesh BJP general secretary Pankaj Singh, who has been busy campaigning for his father and Home Minister Rajnath Singh in the Lucknow Lok Sabha seat, said it is not a "tight fight" for the Union Minister who is seeking re-election from this constituency. "I am very sure the (winning) margin is going to increase this time," Pankaj Singh told NDTV today after he and his father voted at a polling booth in Lucknow.The alliance between Akhilesh Yadav's Samajwadi Party and Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party is being seen as a formidable opponent for the BJP in Uttar Pradesh in this year's national election.

Amid reports of EVM glitches, nearly 10 per cent turnout was recorded today in the first two hours of polling in 14 Lok Sabha seats of UP where Union ministers Rajnath Singh and Smriti Irani, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Congress President Rahul Gandhi are in the fray. Among early voters in the state capital included Home Minister Rajnath Singh, BSP supremo Mayawati, Deputy Chief Minister Dinesh Sharma and DGP OP Singh. Election officials said polling was going on smoothly, barring some complaints of EVM malfunctioning, which were attended to immediately to ensure voting was not hampered. In the first two hours, maximum of 11.11 percent voting was witnessed in Sitapur, while Lucknow recorded 8.78 per cent. Raebareli and Amethi witnessed 9.95 per cent and 8.17 per cent turnout respectively, EC officials said. The BJP had bagged 12 of these seats in 2014 with the Congress winning Rae Bareli and Amethi. The Union Home Minister is seeking re-election from Lucknow, while his colleague at the Centre Smriti Irani is again taking on Rahul Gandhi in Amethi.

The biggest test will arguably be for Rahul Gandhi, who will need to prove that Amethi remains a Congress stronghold despite intense attacks from Smriti Irani. Although the opposition "mahagathbandhan" or "grand alliance" in Uttar Pradesh excluded the Congress from the grouping, it has opted against fielding candidates from Amethi and Raebareli (where Sonia Gandhi is contesting) to prevent fragmentation of non-BJP votes. Rahul Gandhi had defeated Ms Irani by over one lakh votes in the 2014 elections despite an overall decline in voting percentage.

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BJP's Amethi candidate Smriti Irani slammed Congress president Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and accused the Gandhi family of playing politics, even at the cost of a person's life. She was referring to a person who died after he was denied treatment in an Amethi hospital in which Rahul Gandhi is a trustee. On Priyanka Gandhi, Union minister Smriti Irani said: "She did not know my name 5 years back, now she keeps taking my name, such an accomplishment. Nowadays she takes her husband's name less and my name more."

Confident of victory in the Lok Sabha elections, Poonam Sinha, the Samajwadi Party's newly-inducted member said, "I think the situation, the timing is different. This is 2019, not 2014. People are disgruntled. Wherever I have campaigned, people are asking for badlav (change). So this is the right time for me to do this," Poonam Sinha, 69, told NDTV as voting took place in Lucknow and 13 other constituencies in Uttar Pradesh in the fifth round of the national election. Asked whether she was nervous, Poonam Sinha shot back: "Whose wife am I? Confidence, thy name is Shatrughan Sinha. I think a little bit of that confidence has rubbed off on me too. I am very happy and confident that I am going to fight a great battle and hopefully come out a winner."

Voting is yet to begin in two polling booths in Raebareli and one in Amethi. Both Raebareli and Amethi seats are held by the Gandhis. The reason for the delay is because of malfunctioning voting machines or EVMs in those booths.

While Congress president Rahul Gandhi is seeking a fourth term from Amethi, his mother and UPA chairperson, Sonia Gandhi, is a parliamentarian from Raebareli, a seat she has held since 2004.

Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati voted at a polling booth in UP's  Lucknow this morning. She appealed to the people to "use their voting rights wisely". "Every voter should use the right to vote wisely. Everybody should get out of their homes to cast their votes," she said.

Rahul Gandhi's mother, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, is seeking a fourth term from UP's Raebareli. She has been holding the seat after vacating Amethi for Rahul Gandhi in 2004.

Congress chief Rahul Gandhi is seeking re-election for a fourth consecutive term from family turf Amethi. Challenging him is the BJP's Smriti Irani, who, despite her defeat from the seat in 2014, has frequently visited the area. Ms Irani claimed that the prospect of defeat from Amethi has pushed Mr Gandhi to contest from a second seat - Kerala's Wayanad.

Today is a crucial day of polling in Uttar Pradesh, where top leaders will see their constituencies decide if they would return as the representatives of the people in parliament. Amethi, which Congress chief Rahul Gandhi represents; Raebareli, which UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi represents in parliament, and Lucknow, which BJP's Rajnath Singh represents, all go to vote today. Whether these senior leaders of the Congress and BJP return to parliament from their current constituencies would only be known on May 23.

Voting for phase 5 of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections began at 7 am this morning. This phase has 51 parliamentary constituencies going to polls across 7 states. After today's voting ends at 5 pm, the 2019 general elections would see 424 of the total 543 Lok Sabha constituencies complete the polling process. The result for all 543 seats will be declared together on May 23.