New Delhi: Election 2019 kicked off to a troubled start on Thursday with two people being killed in clashes in Andhra Pradesh, IED blasts in Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh, reports of EVM glitches and multiple complaints from voters about their names not being on the electoral list.
As round one of the seven-phase Lok Sabha election began in 91 constituencies across the length and breadth of India, from the hills of Kashmir to the islands of Andaman and Nicobar, reports of unrest and irregularities cast shadows over the world’s biggest poll process.
There were reports of violence from Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh while the chiefs of several parties, including TDP’s N Chandrababu Naidu, AAP’s Arvind Kejriwal and PDP’s Mehbooba Mufti, came forward to complain about administrative and other lapses.
In Andhra Pradesh, where elections were held for 25 Lok Sabha and 175 Assembly seats, one worker from the ruling Telugu Desam Party and one from the main opposition YSR Congress were killed in a clash in a village in Tadipatri Assembly constituency in Anantapuramu district.
Condemning the killing of his party worker, TDP president Chandrababu Naidu accused the YSR Congress of indulging in violence to win the election.
The opposition countered it by saying followers of local TDP MP and MLA, the JC brothers (MP J C Diwakar Reddy and MLA J C Prabhakar Reddy) tried to rig votes in a polling booth in Veerapuram village.
The two parties clashed in other parts of the state as well with reports of stone throwing and allegations of attacks and vandalism coming in from Eluru city as well as from Jammalamadugu in Kadapa district and Narsaraopet constituency in Guntur district.
Elsewhere in the state, Madhusudan Gupta, a candidate of the Jana Sena Party, was arrested after he smashed an EVM in Guntakal, alleging that party symbols were not properly printed on the ballot unit.
In Maharashtra, Naxals triggered an IED blast near a polling booth in Waghezari area of Gadchiroli district while voting was underway, police said. There were no casualties.
Later in the day, two police commandos escorting a poll party were injured in an IED blast in Etapalli in the district.
In the Naxal stronghold of Chhattisgarh, four guerrillas were arrested and firearms seized from them in Bijapur district while the poll process was underway.
In the early hours of the morning, Naxals detonated an IED in Narayanpur in Bastar region. No casualties were reported here too.
Many miles away, an IED was detected in an oil pipeline passing through a tea garden in Assam’s Dibrugarh district. Security forces rushed to the spot to ensure there is no trouble.
In Kairana in western Uttar Pradesh, BSF personnel fired in the air at a polling booth when some people, who were not carrying their identity cards, tried to forcibly enter the premises to cast their votes, police said.
