BJP faces wipe out in Bastar as Chitrakot votes on Monday

Chhattisgarhs ruling Congress has put its all might to flush BJP out of the sprawling but restive Bastar region as Chitrakot assembly seat is all set for voting on Monday.

Bastar has total 12 assembly seats and the BJP would be driven out of the key tribal stronghold region if it loses Chitrakot where the Congress is reportedly comfortable to retain the seat.

A total of 1,67,911 electors including 88,626 women are eligible to exercise their franchise to seal the fate of six candidates though the main fight is between Congress' Rajman Benzam and former legislator Lachhuram Kashyap of the BJP.

Election Commission has set up 229 polling booths and deployed thousands of security personnel to ensure a free and fair polling in the Scheduled Tribe reserved seat which is partially infested by maoist militancy since late 1980s.

The polling was necessitated as sitting legislator of the Congress resigned after being elected to the Lok Sabha from Bastar seat of which Chitrakot is one of the assembly segments. The result would be declared on October 24 along with the assembly seats of Maharashtra and Haryana where the BJP is in the power.

The BJP and the Congress had conducted high-voltage electioneering in Chitrakot. Chhattisgarh's former chief minister Raman Singh was the star campaigner for the saffron party while Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel led the campaign for the Congress.

Reports emerging from the ground say Congress is well poised to retain the seat but the BJP has scotched all such reports and claimed it will wrest the seat from the Congress as the Bhupesh Baghel government has let down people in its nearly 10-month-long regime.

( With inputs from IANS )