EC has installed CCTV cameras in 130 of 176 polling booths
Wednesday, 20 NOVEMBER 2024 | PNS | DEHRADUN
The polling for the crucial Kedarnath Assembly by-election will be held on Wednesday. The Election Commission has made all the preparations for the bypoll. The voting in 176 booths of the constituency will commence at 8 am and end at 6 pm. The district returning officer Saurabh Gaharwar said that 166 polling parties were sent from the Agastyamuni sports ground to their destinations on Tuesday while seven parties had departed on Monday. He said that police personnel are accompanying the polling parties and forest rangers are also deployed in the polling stations located near the forest areas. The administration has divided the constituency into two zones and 27 sectors. The election commission has made arrangements of webcasting from 130 polling booths. It is for the first time that the EC has installed CCTV cameras in 75 per cent of the polling booths.
In the bypoll 90,875 voters (44,919 male and 45,956 female) are eligible to exercise their franchise. Though there are six candidates in the fray there is a direct contest between Asha Nautiyal of BJP and Manoj Rawat of Congress party.
The BJP has won the constituency three times while Congress has registered victory on two occasions in the past.
In the first Assembly election of the State held in the year 2002, Asha Nautiyal defeated Shaila Rani Rawat by a margin of 3,465 votes. She registered her second consecutive victory from the seat in the elections of 2007. However in the elections of 2012 Shaila Rani Rawat won from the constituency on Congress party ticket. In the elections of 2017, Manoj Rawat of Congress secured victory from the constituency while in 2022 Assembly elections Shaila Rani Rawat won on BJP ticket. Her death on July 9 this year necessitated the by-election in Kedarnath. Kuldeep Rawat who secured second position in the elections of 2017 and 2022 as an independent candidate is in BJP’s fold now. The political observers are predicting a close contest in the bypoll as both BJP and Congress have made it an issue of prestige.
Chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami took the direct command of the BJP’s campaign in his hands.
Just ahead of the imposition of the model code of conduct (MCC), Dhami had announced a mega package of Rs 750 Crore for Kedarnath.
Led by CM Dhami, the ministers of his cabinet, BJP president Mahendra Bhatt and former CMs Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank and Trivendra Singh Rawat the BJP focused its campaign on development of the constituency and reconstruction work of Kedarnath Dham. The BJP leaders tried to emphasize to the voters that the victory of the party will ensure completion of the developmental projects currently underway in the constituency. In the last phase of the campaign the party also raised the issues of land, love and spit Jihad.
Congress on the other hand focused its campaign on the alleged attempts to divert the Yatra and prestige of Kedarnath dham. Its leaders led by former CM Harish Rawat and former Pradesh Congress committee ( PCC) president Ganesh Godiyal accused the BJP government of ignoring the area which was affected by huge natural disasters in the year 2013 and in August 32 this year. The Congress also made the issues of missing gold from Kedarnath temple and attempts to construct Kedarnath Dham in Buradi area of New Delhi as an election plank.
