Assembly bypolls deferred due to low voter turnout fear: Election official

Lucknow: Bypolls on nine assembly seats in Uttar Pradesh were deferred in view of several political parties fearing a low voter turnout due to festivals in the coming week, an official from the Election Commission said on Monday.

According to the revised date, voting, earlier scheduled to take place on November 13, will now be conducted on November 20.

The date for counting of votes, unchanged, will be November 23.

Additional Chief Electoral Officer Chandrashekhar in a statement said that the date for the election was changed in view of the requests made by several political parties (including Bharatiya Janata Party, Indian National Congress, Bahujan Samaj Party and Rashtriya Lok Dal) and certain social organisations.

The parties feared that due to large-scale “social, cultural, and religious engagements” on November 13, people may not turn up to cast their votes.

The EC Monday rescheduled assembly bypolls to November 20 for Kerala and Punjab as well.

Polling will be held on four seats in Punjab and one seat in Kerala.

In UP, the nine assembly seats going to polls are Katehari (Ambedkar Nagar), Karhal (Mainpuri), Meerapur (Muzaffarnagar), Ghaziabad, Majhawan (Mirzapur), Sishamau (Kanpur City), Khair (Aligarh), Phulpur (Prayagraj) and Kundarki (Moradabad).

Eight of these seats fell vacant after their MLAs were elected as Lok Sabha MPs, while bypoll is being held on the Sisamau seat due to the disqualification of SP MLA Irfan Solanki, who was convicted in a criminal case.

In the 2022 assembly polls, Sishamau, Katehari, Karhal, Milkipur and Kundarki were held by the SP, while the BJP had won Phulpur, Ghaziabad, Majhawan and Khair.

The Meerapur seat was held by the RLD, which is now an ally of the BJP in the NDA.

The Congress is not contesting the bypolls and supporting its INDIA bloc partner SP, while the BSP is contesting solo on all nine seats.