Stage set for 1st phase of UP municipal polls on Thursday

Lucknow, May 3 The stage is set for polling in the first phase of the urban municipal polls in Uttar Pradesh on Thursday amid tight security arrangements.

According to the state election commission (SEC), people in 37 districts will vote in the first phase to elect 7,593 representatives, including 10 mayors and 820 corporators.

The second-phase polling will take place on May 11.

The two-phase elections will be a key test for the parties ahead of next year's Lok Sabha polls.

More than 2.40 crore voters are eligible to exercise their franchise in the first round of voting, officials said and added that all the posts are being contested on party symbols.

In the first phase, polling will be held for posts of 103 nagar palika parishad chairpersons and 2,740 nagar palika parishad members.

Apart from this, the voters in the first phase will also decide the fate of 275 nagar panchayat chairpersons and 3,645 nagar panchayat members.

Altogether 44,232 candidates are in the fray in the opening round.

State Election Commissioner Manoj Kumar said that 85 representatives, including 10 corporators, have already been elected unopposed.

The districts where mayoral election will be held in the first phase are Saharanpur, Agra, Moradabad, Firozabad, Mathura, Jhansi, Prayagraj, Lucknow, Gorakhpur and Varanasi.

Counting for both phases will be done on May 13.

For security arrangements during the first phase, 2 lakh men in uniform comprising 35 companies of the Central Armed Police Forces and 86 companies of PAC have been deployed.

Senior police officials said as many as 19,880 inspectors, 1 01 lakh head constables, 47,985 home guards and 7,500 trainee sub inspectors will also be part of the security paraphernalia.

Special DG, Law and Order, Prashant Kumar, said to ensure peaceful polling, so far 1,101 persons have been booked under Gangster Act while NSA has been slapped on another 14 who are already in jail and wanted bail ahead of the polling.

"Another 2,012 troublemakers have been externed from different districts in the state. Likewise, 6.48 lakh others were booked for breach of peace in the last 15 days," he said.

The Special DG said that as part of the exercise, 42 illegal factories making country made pistols were busted in which 2,958 arms and 4,500 cartridges were recovered. Similarly, low intensity explosives weighing 3,470 kg were seized.

Police also arrested 987 persons smuggling drugs worth Rs 37 crore, while 2.99 lakh litres of illicit liquor was seized and 766 booked for manufacturing/smuggling illicit liquor.

The police official added that 8.19 lakh vehicles flouting rules have been booked while 7426 others seized in violation of poll code across the state.