Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s mother 100-year-old Hiraba Modi cast her vote for Gandhinagar civic election. She cast her vote at a polling booth in Gandhinagar amid tight security. There are 2.8 lakh registered voters in Gandhinagar, while the number of wards, each of which have four seats, has increased from eight in 2016, when the Congress and BJP won 16 seats each, to 11 now due to delimitation and addition of more areas. This time, it is going to be a three-cornered contest with the Aam Aadmi Party claiming that people are seeing it as an alternative to the BJP and Congress.
People queued up outside the polling booths to cast their votes. The process began at 7am and will continue till 6pm. Nearly five per cent votes were cast in the first two hours in Gandhinagar Municipal Corporation (GMC).
Voting for the GMC and three municipalities of Okha, Bhanvad, and Thara in Gujarat began on Sunday morning. Votes are also being cast for the by-elections to seats vacated in some municipal corporations, municipalities, as well as district and taluka panchayats.
Elections are being held for 44 seats in GMC, for which a total of 161 candidates are in the fray, including 44 from BJP and Congress each and 40 from Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), among others.
Apart from the traditional rivals—BJP and Congress—AAP has fielded candidates on almost all the seats in the local body election for which voting is being held Sunday.
Votes are also being cast for the by-elections to three seats in two municipal corporations – Ahmedabad and Junagadh – 42 seats in 26 municipalities, eight seats in seven district panchayats, and 43 seats in 37 taluka panchayats that were vacated since the elections in March elections.
