In 3rd Phase of Lok Sabha Polls, 94 Seats Up for Grabs; PM Modi, Amit Shah to Cast Vote in Ahmedabad

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and union home minister Amit Shah, who is the BJP candidate for Gujarat’s Gandhinagar, will both cast their vote in the third phase of the Lok Sabha elections on Tuesday (May 7). The high-stakes phase will have bigwigs from the ruling party and prominent names from the opposition INDIA bloc.

A day before the polling, in a post on X, the prime minister said he will be voting in Ahmedabad, which is under the Gandhinagar Lok Sabha constituency. He urged others to come out and cast their vote in “record numbers”.

After today’s exceptional programmes in Odisha and Andhra Pradesh, reached Gujarat. In the morning tomorrow, 7th May, I will be voting in Ahmedabad. I urge all those who are to vote tomorrow to do so in record numbers as well.— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) May 6, 2024

Voting will be held in 94 constituencies spread over 10 states and one union territory. Over 1,300 candidates, including 120 women, are in the fray and more than 11 crore people will be eligible to vote in this phase.

All eyes are on the BJP, which won an overwhelming majority in these seats – all in Gujarat, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh – in the 2019 general elections. Apart from Amit Shah in Gandhinagar, other big names are Jyotiraditya Scindia (Guna), Mansukh Mandaviya (Porbandar), Parshottam Rupala (Rajkot), Pralhad Joshi (Dharwad) and SP Singh Baghel (Agra).

In the run-up to the third phase, the BJP-led NDA and the INDIA bloc have fiercely attacked each other on issues like reservations and sexual harassment charges against JD(S)-BJP candidate Prajwal Revanna.

Who are the key candidates?

While Prime Minister Modi will only be casting his vote in this phase, Shah is the biggest name to be contesting the election in the third phase. The two leaders will cast their vote in Ahmedabad city, which is under the Gandhinagar Lok Sabha constituency.

Former Madhya Pradesh chief ministers Shivraj Singh Chouhan (Vidisha) and Digvijaya Singh (Rajgarh) have also returned to the poll fray this time. Amid allegations of sexual abuse against BJP-JD(S) candidate Prajwal Revanna, who has managed to flee the country, the fate of former Karnataka CM Basavaraj Bommai (Haveri) will also be decided.

Baramati is also poised for a riveting contest as sitting MP and Sharad Pawar’s daughter Supriya Sule takes on her sister-in-law Sunetra Pawar, who is the wife of deputy CM and Sharad Pawar’s estranged nephew Ajit Pawar.

In UP, it is an all-important phase for the Yadavs with Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav’s wife Dimple Yadav aiming to retain the Mainpuri. She had won this seat in a bypoll following the death of her father-in-law Mulayam Singh Yadav.

There are others from the family in the fray too. Akshaya Yadav, son of SP national principal general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav, will try to reclaim Firozabad that he won in 2014. Aditya Yadav, the son of SP national general secretary Shivpal Yadav, is making his electoral debut from Budaun, which was represented by his cousin Dharmendra Yadav in 2014.

What were the key issues during the campaign?

Wealth redistribution and inheritance tax became the most talked-about issues ahead of the third phase of polling. The PM led the BJP charge, asking the Congress to give in writing that it will not hand over the quota for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes to Muslims. Leaders of the saffron party accused the Congress of pursuing appeasement politics.

The Congress and its allies, meanwhile, accused the BJP of trying to tamper with the Constitution and do away with reservations. The principal opposition party, which has promised to remove the 50 per cent cap on reservations, also asked the BJP to clear its stance on the issue. The party reiterated its commitment to conduct a caste census and economic survey if voted to power.

Congress leaders, including Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, have attacked the BJP over allegations of sexual abuse against Hassan MP Prajwal Revanna of the JD(S), which is an ally of the BJP. Hitting back, Shah and others questioned why the Congress government in Karnataka delayed the action against the JD(S) leader.

Prajwal is the grandson of former prime minister and JD(S) patriarch HD Deve Gowda and was the JD(S)-BJP alliance candidate from the Hassan seat, which went to polls on April 26. Prajwal’s father HD Revanna was arrested by the special investigation team on May 4 in a kidnapping case linked to sexual abuse allegations against his son, soon after a court rejected his anticipatory bail plea.

The BJP has already bagged Surat unopposed, so 25 seats in the PM Modi’s home state of Gujarat will go to polls, besides 11 seats in Maharashtra, 10 seats in Uttar Pradesh, the remaining 14 out of 28 in Karnataka, seven in Chhattisgarh, five in Bihar, four each in Assam and West Bengal, and both seats in Goa. Voting will also take place in Dadra and Nagar Haveli as well as Daman and Diu (two seats), and nine seats in Madhya Pradesh, including Betul where the election was deferred.

After the third phase, voting will be completed in 283 out of 543 seats in Lok Sabha. The next four phases will be on May 13, May 20, May 25 and June 1. The counting of votes is on June 4.

Here is all you need to know about the states and UTs going to polls in the third phase:

Assam: The BJP has put up only one candidate in this phase for the Guwahati seat, while its alliance partners Asom Gana Parishad are contesting in two – Dhubri and Barpeta – and the UPPL in Kokrajhar. The Congress is contesting from all four seats – Dhubri, Barpeta, Kokrajhar (ST) and Guwahati. With this, polling will conclude in Assam. Chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and union minister Sarbananda Sonowal spearheaded the campaign for the BJP in the state, stressing on the importance of the PM Modi’s return for a third successive term. Opposition parties, led by Congress leader Gaurav Gogoi, Raijor Dal’s Akhil Gogoi and Assam Jatiya Parishad’s Lurinjyoti Gogoi, focused on issues such as citizenship, connectivity, infrastructure, unemployment, and price rise.

Bihar: The constituencies in the third phase are Araria, Jhanjharpur, Supaul, Madhepura and Khagaria, all held by the NDA. More than 98 lakh people will vote in Bihar to decide the fate of 54 candidates. The BJP holds Araria, where sitting MP Pradeep Singh’s bid to retain the seat has received the main challenge from RJD’s Shahnawaz, whose late father Taslimuddin, a former union minister, had wrested the constituency from the saffron party leader in 2014, surmounting the Modi wave. The RJD is also locked in straight battles with JD(U) in Madhepura and Supaul. Young voters are significant in number, with 1.45 lakh in the age group of 18-19 and another 22.84 lakh aged between 20 and 29 years.

Chhattisgarh: Amid heightened security, the remaining seven seats – Raipur, Durg, Bilaspur, Korba, Janjgir-Champa (SC), Surguja (ST) and Raigarh (ST) – will vote in the third phase with 168 candidates in the fray. The main contest lies between the BJP, which had won 10 out of 11 seats in 2004, 2009 and 2014. In 2019, the BJP bagged nine constituencies and the Congress two. A total of 1,39,01,285 voters are eligible to exercise their franchise. High-profile Raipur is also included in this phase, where state minister and BJP leader Brijmohan Agrawal is facing off against former MLA Vikas Upadhyay of the Congress. In Korba seat, the BJP has fielded its influential woman leader and former MP Saroj Pandey against the sitting MP Jyotsana Mahant, wife of the incumbent leader of the opposition Charandas Mahant. A high-decibel campaign saw exchanges over issues like corruption, reservation and Naxalism.

Goa: More than 11 lakh voters are eligible to exercise their franchise in both the Lok Sabha seats in Goa, where the Congress and BJP are locked in a straight fight. The coastal state has two Lok Sabha constituencies, North Goa and South Goa. North Goa will see the BJP’s sitting MP Shripad Naik take on Ramakant Khalap of the Congress while, in South Goa, the saffron party has fielded entrepreneur Pallavi Dempo against Navy-veteran-turned politician Viriato Fernandes of the Congress. The South Goa Lok Sabha seat is currently held by Francisco Sardinha of the Congress. A total of 16 candidates, eight each in North and South Goa, are in the fray.

Gujarat: The BJP’s Mukesh Dalal has already won from Surat unopposed after the nomination of Congress’s Nilesh Kumbhani was rejected and other candidates withdrew. The saffron party had swept all 26 seats in 2019 and is hoping to blank out the Congress once again. Bypolls to five assembly seats will also be held simultaneously. Modi and Shah will cast their vote in Ahmedabad city, which is under Gandhinagar seat. Modi will exercise his franchise at a booth in Nishan Public School in Ranip locality, while Shah will vote at Naranpura sub-zonal office in the city. Poll officials said 4.97 crore people – 2.56 crore males, 2.41 crore females and 1,534 from the third gender – will vote in 50,788 polling booths in urban and rural areas.

Karnataka: Polling will be held in 14 constituencies – Chikkodi, Belgaum, Bagalkot, Bijapur, Gulbarga, Raichur, Bidar, Koppal, Bellary, Haveri, Dharwad, Uttara Kannada, Davangere and Shivamogga. Former CM Basavaraj Bommai is contesting from Haveri.

Madhya Pradesh: The third phase will decide the political fate of former CMs Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Digvijaya Singh, as well as civil aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia. Voting will be held for nine seats in Madhya Pradesh and more than 1.77 crore voters will decide the fate of 127 candidates contesting from Morena, Bhind (SC), Gwalior, Guna, Sagar, Vidisha, Bhopal, Rajgarh and Betul (ST). Chief electoral officer (CEO), Madhya Pradesh, Anupam Rajan, told reporters that polling in Betul was initially scheduled to be held in the second phase on April 26, but was deferred to the third phase due to the death of a candidate. Scindia is seeking to reclaim his home turf Guna, which he lost in 2019 when he was in the Congress. Chouhan is contesting from Vidisha constituency, a saffron fortress which he had represented five times in Lok Sabha in the past, after almost 17 years, facing Congress candidate Pratap Bhanu Sharma. In Rajgarh, 77-year-old Congress veteran and former CM Digvijaya Singh is seeking to reclaim his lost legacy after more than 30 years. His challenger is two-time BJP MP Rodmal Nagar. He won from Rajgarh in 1984 and 1991 but lost in 1989. He became the CM of Madhya Pradesh in 1993. Of the total 29 seats in the state, polling has concluded for 12 seats in the first two phases on April 19 and 26. The remaining eight will go to polls in the fourth phase on May 13.

Maharashtra: All eyes are on Baramati as polling takes place in 11 out of 48 Lok Sabha seats in the state. The spotlight is on the high-stakes battle, where Sharad Pawar’s daughter Supriya Sule is pitted against Ajit Pawar’s wife Sunetra Pawar. Polling will take place in Baramati, Raigad, Osmanabad, Latur, Solapur, Madha, Sangli, Satara, Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg, Kolhapur and Hatkanangale. Prominent contestants also include royal scions Shahu Chhatrapati of the Congress in Kolhapur and BJP’s Udayanraje Bhosale in Satara as well as union minister Narayan Rane in Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg. Altogether 2.09 crore persons are eligible to vote for 258 candidates in the third phase.

Uttar Pradesh: The Yadav family members are in focus in the third phase as 10 constituencies are going to polls in the third phase. While Dimple Yadav is aiming to retain the Mainpuri seat, which she won in the bypolls following the death of her father-in-law Mulayam Singh Yadav, Akshaya Yadav, son of Ram Gopal Yadav, the national principal general secretary of SP, will try to reclaim the Firozabad seat that he had won in 2014. Aditya Yadav, the son of SP national general secretary Shivpal Yadav, is making his electoral debut from the Budaun, which was represented by his cousin Dharmendra Yadav in 2014. Besides the Yadav family members, polling will be held to seal the fate of union minister SP Singh Baghel, state tourism minister Jayveer Singh, minister of state for revenue Anoop Pradhan Balmiki. Baghel, Jayveer Singh, and Balmiki are contesting from Agra (SC), Mainpuri, and Hathras (SC) Lok Sabha seats, respectively. Rajveer Singh, son of former Uttar Pradesh CM and BJP stalwart Kalyan Singh, is looking to score a hat-trick from the Etah parliamentary constituency.

West Bengal: The four seats going to polls are Muslim-majority. The division of minority votes among the Left-Congress combine and the TMC and the narrative on the Citizenship Amendment Act could shape outcomes in Maldaha Uttar, Maldaha Dakshin, Jangipur and Murshidabad. The ruling TMC holds both Murshidabad and Jangipur Lok Sabha seats. A total of 73,37,651 voters, including 36,12,395 women and 154 third-genders, are eligible to exercise their franchise. Murshidabad will witness a key contest between senior CPI(M) leader Mohammed Salim, TMC’s Abu Taher Khan and BJP nominee Gouri Shankar Ghosh. Heavyweights like Shah, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, TMC MP Abhishek Banerjee and Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge campaigned for their party candidates in the state.

(With PTI inputs)