Uttarakhand set to go to polls on Wednesday

A total of 628 candidates are in fray for the 70-seat Uttarakhand assembly.

Dehradun, Feb 14: Polling for the 69 assembly seats in the hill state of Uttarakhand will be held on Wednesday. Stakes are high for both the ruling Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party in the crucial assembly polls.

While the BJP is accusing Congress Chief Minister Harish Rawat of turning Devbhoomi (land of gods) into loot bhoomi (land of looters), the Congress is claiming that BJP makes tall promises and that people of Uttarakhand will reject the appeals by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Both Modi and Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi have run an extensive campaign in the hill state trying to woo the 75 lakh plus voters in favour of their candidates.

A total of 628 candidates from different parties and independent backgrounds are trying their luck at the hustings this time round. A total of 10,685 polling booths have been made for the 75,13,547 voters.

Voting in the Karnaprayag seat has been postponed to March 9 as the Bahujan Samaj Party candidate Kuldeep Kanvasi died in an accident during canvassing. On request of the party leadership, the poll panel decided to hold the elections on March 9.

The BSP has been given time till February 20 to file a fresh nomination, scrutiny would be done of February 21 and date of withdrawal is February 21.

IANS