Wednesday, 09 February 2022 | GP Semwal | Pauri
Eight candidates are contesting in Pauri reserved constituency. Candidates of all the parties have put in all efforts to convince the voters with door to door campaign continuing even in cold and inclement weather. Observers opine that the Congress and BJP candidates appear ahead of other candidates. The Aam Aadmi Party is contesting here for the first time and lacks cadre votes compared to BJP and Congress. However, candidates of AAP, Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party and Uttarakhand Kranti Dal among others are doing their bit to affect the equations of BJP and Congress. This seat was a general seat till the 2012 elections. In the 2012 Assembly election, Congress candidate Sunder Lal Mandrawal defeated BJP candidate Ghananand and in the 2017 election BJP’s Mukesh Koli defeated Congress’ Naval Kishore by a margin of 7,030 votes. Both the Congress and BJP have won the reserved seat once each while in the 2007 election independent candidate Yashpal Benam defeated BJP’s Tirath Singh Rawat by a small margin of 11 votes. This time, BJP fielded its former district Raj Kumar Pori while Congress fielded Naval Kishore. Both these candidates have a decent public image but observers opine that acts of the sitting MLA and some allegations may cause damage to the BJP. While BJP is seeking votes in the name of development, the Congress is alleging the absence of development works. The total number of voters in Pauri constituency is 95,340 which includes 46,813 males, 46,085 female along with 2,440 service voters.The male and female voters are nearly equal though the female voters may play a cruicial role.
