LUCKNOW, 09 APRIL: Voting began at 8 am today and ended at 4 pm on 27 of the 36 vacant seats in the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council. An average voter turnout of 98.11 per cent was recorded in all the 27 seats. However, counting of votes will take place on April 12.
According to the information received from the office of the Chief Electoral Officer, till 4 pm, 97 percent in Moradabad-Bijnor seat, Rampur-Bareilly- 97.37, Pilibhit-Shahjahanpur 97.38, Sitapur-99.20, Lucknow-Unnao 98.90, Rae Bareilly-99.35, Pratapgarh-99.25. , Sultanpur-98.77, Barabanki-99.16, Bahraich-98.91, Gonda-98.28, Faizabad-98.44, Basti-Siddharthnagar-97.18, Gorakhpur-Maharajganj-96.50, Deoria-98.11, Azamgarh-Mau-98.42, Ballia-98.25, Ghazipur- 98.88, Jaunpur-98.28, Varanasi-98.52, Allahabad-97.96, Jhansi-Jalaun-Lalitpur-98.90, Kanpur-Fatehpur-97.20, Etawah-Farrukhabad-96.65, Agra-Firozabad-98.06, Meerut-Ghaziabad-97.43 and Muzaffarnagar-Saharanpur seat. But the voter turnout was 96.69 percent.
An Election Commission spokesperson said that polling was held peacefully from 8 am to 4 pm at 739 polling places for all the 27 seats. There is no report of any untoward incident from anywhere. Voter turnout was 20.02 per cent in the first two hours, 60.92 till 12 noon, 90.42 till 2 pm and 98.11 per cent till 4 pm.
A total of 95 candidates are in the fray for 27 seats. The number of voters is one lakh twenty thousand 657. These 27 seats are spread in 58 districts of the state. BJP candidates have been elected unopposed in nine out of 36 vacant seats of the Legislative Council.
Unopposed election in these nine seats
Of the 36 vacant seats in the Legislative Council, nine members have been elected unopposed from eight constituencies. Of these, one each from Badaun, Hardoi, Kheri, Mirzapur-Sonbhadra, Banda-Hamirpur, Aligarh and Bulandshahr and two from Mathura-Etah-Mainpuri constituencies have been elected unopposed. Among them, Vagish Pathak, from Badaun, Ashok Agarwal-Hardoi, Anoop Gupta-Kheeri, Shyam Narayan Singh, Mirzapur-Sonbhadra, Jitendra Singh Sengar, Banda-Hamirpur, Rishipal Singh, Aligarh and Narendra Bhati have been elected unopposed from Bulandshahr. Om Prakash Singh and Ashish Yadav have been elected unopposed from Mathura-Eta-Mainpuri.