Fate of contestants to be locked in EVMs today

Sirathu (Kaushambi): Fate of candidates in fray for Sirathu assembly bypoll will be locked in Electronic Voting Machine (EVMs) on Saturday. Though 15 candidates, including Lal Chand of Congress, are in fray, the direct contest is between Samajwadi Party (SP) Vachaspati Pasi and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Santosh Patel.
The seat fell vacant after MLA Keshav Prasad Maurya (BJP) won the Phulpur seat in Lok Sabha polls.Around 3, 39, 092 voters, including 1,86,341 males and 1,42,739 women, would decide the fate of these candidates in the EVMs at 336 polling booths.
Kaushambi administration has made adequate security arrangements. Around 206 polling centres have been declared sensitive. In fact, all booths have turned into a fortress with central para-military forces being deployed for free and fair polls. Around 12 companies of central para-military forces along with a company and to platoons have been deployed for security purpose.
District Magistrate\ district election officer Rajmani Yadav said “22 sector magistrates, three zonal magistrates and three static magistrates have been deployed for smooth polls along with 206 micro-observers. Web casting of activities will be undertaken at 10 polling booths.” The voting will begin at 7 am and continue till 6 pm.
Apart from central and para-military forces, adequate civil police staff, including three DSPs, three inspectors, 88 sub-inspectors, 132 head constables and 793 constables too have been deployed.
As per Election Commission’s directives, each sector magistrate would observe polling at six polling centres and would visit all polling booth\centre concerned at least twice or thrice. Moreover, videography would be undertaken at all polling booths.
On Friday, 336 polling parties were dispatched to centres concerned. The Kaushambi district administration has also set up a control room to monitor the activities (05331-232665) and note complaints or other grievances if any regarding polls.
District authorities, meanwhile, urged the voters to come out and exercise their franchise. The measures have been initiated to increase the voting percentage.