Voting for 69 Assembly constituencies across 12 districts of Uttar Pradesh is on in the state’s third phase of polling today. The fate of a total of 826 candidates will be decided in this phase.
The key seats to watch out for are Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh’s Lok Sabha constituency Lucknow, and Samajwadi Party strongholds Kannauj, Mainpuri and Etawah.
Apart from those listed above, Farrukhabad, Hardoi, Auraiya, Kanpur Dehat, Kanpur, Unnao, Barabanki and Sitapur are the other 8 districts where polling is being held.
Etawah is the hometown of Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, while another key district is Mainpuri, from where SP leader Tej Pratap Yadav is an MP. Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav’s wife Dimple Yadav is an MP from Kannauj.
In the 2012 Assembly polls, Samajwadi Party had won 55 of these 69 seats, while the BSP, the BJP and the Congress secured just six, five and two seats respectively. One seat went to an Independent.
As many as 2.41 crore voters, including 1.10 crore women and 1,026 belonging to third gender category, will exercise their franchise in this round.While the maximum number of 21 candidates are contesting from Etawah, a minimum of three are in Haidergarh (Barabanki).
Lucknow West and Central constituencies have 17 candidates each.
