Elections 2024: With Campaigning Ending for 49 Seats in the Fifth Phase, Whose Fate Will Be Decided on May 20?

Lok Sabha Elections 2024: The campaign for the fifth phase of the Lok Sabha elections ended on Saturday evening. In the fifth phase, voting is to be held on 20 May for 49 Lok Sabha seats in six states and two union territories. In this phase, voting will also take place in two ‘high profile’ seats Rae Bareli and Amethi, from where former Congress President Rahul Gandhi and Union Minister Smriti Irani are in the fray respectively. 22 candidates are in the fray in Baramulla, Jammu and Kashmir. Former Chief Minister Omar Abdullah is also contesting from this seat and he did a road show in Soibug village of central Kashmir on the last day of election campaign. 

On Monday, voting will take place in 13 seats in Maharashtra, 14 in Uttar Pradesh, seven in West Bengal, five in Bihar, three in Jharkhand, five in Odisha and one each in Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh. The campaign has also ended in 35 assembly constituencies of Odisha, where BJD president and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik is among the candidates.

More than 40 of the seats going to polls in the fifth phase were with the National Democratic Alliance. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) stressed on the issues of appeasement, dynastic politics, Ram Mandir, Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), corruption and welfare schemes of his government.

During the campaign, PM Modi claimed, “If Samajwadi Party (SP) and Congress come to power, they will send Ram Lalla back to the tent and bulldozer the temple.” He also alleged that the opposition wants to bring back the repealed Article 370.

The Congress and other constituents of the ‘India’ alliance accused the BJP of polarising voters through its “Hindu-Muslim politics” and not focusing on issues like unemployment and inflation. They were also aggressive on the issues of reservation and protection of the Constitution.

The Election Commission on Tuesday said it hoped that star campaigners, especially from national parties, would set an example in the remaining three phases of the Lok Sabha elections and not vitiate the social fabric.

Many Union Ministers are included in the fifth phase  

Other prominent candidates in the fifth phase of Lok Sabha elections include several Union ministers including Rajnath Singh (Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh), Piyush Goyal (Mumbai North, Maharashtra), Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti (Fatehpur, UP) and Shantanu Thakur (Bangaon, West Bengal), LJP (Ram Vilas) leader Chirag Paswan (Hajipur, Bihar), Shiv Sena’s Shrikant Shinde (Kalyan, Maharashtra) and BJP’s Rajiv Pratap Rudy and RJD president Lalu Prasad’s daughter Rohini Acharya (both Saran, Bihar).

Rahul Gandhi, who is contesting from Wayanad in Kerala, is also contesting from Rae Bareli, the bastion of the Nehru-Gandhi family, which was represented by his mother Sonia Gandhi since 2004. The BJP has fielded Uttar Pradesh minister Dinesh Pratap Singh from this seat.

Union Minister Smriti Irani is in the fray in Amethi, while KL Sharma, a close aide of the Gandhi family, has been fielded by the Congress. 

In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Irani defeated Rahul Gandhi in Amethi.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh is eyeing his fourth term from Lucknow. He is pitted against SP’s sitting MLA (from Lucknow Central) Ravidas Mehrotra.

In Uttar Pradesh, in this phase, polling will be held in 14 Lok Sabha constituencies namely Mohanlalganj (reserved), Lucknow, Rae Bareli, Amethi, Jalaun (reserved), Jhansi, Hamirpur, Banda, Fatehpur, Kaushambi (reserved), Barabanki (reserved), Faizabad, Kaiserganj, Gonda.

Other prominent candidates in the fifth phase include Union Minister Kaushal Kishore-Mohanlalganj, Union Minister Bhanu Pratap Singh Verma-Jalaun, Union Minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti and MP Lallu Singh-Faizabad Lok Sabha seat.

Rajiv Pratap Rudy VS Rohini Acharya in Saran 

Voting will also be held on Monday in Bihar’s five Lok Sabha seats – Saran, Muzaffarpur, Hajipur, Sitamarhi and Madhubani – which will decide the electoral fate of 80 candidates.

On behalf of the NDA, Prime Minister Narendra Modi held rallies in Hajipur, Saran and Muzaffarpur. Chirag Paswan is contesting from Hajipur, while Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidates are in the fray on the remaining two seats.

In Saran, former Union Minister Rajiv Pratap Rudy is pitted against Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) president Lalu Prasad’s daughter Rohini Acharya. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath have campaigned in favour of Rudy.

264 candidates are in the fray for 13 seats in Maharashtra 

The campaign in 13 Lok Sabha constituencies of North Maharashtra and Mumbai Metropolitan Region ended at 6 pm on Saturday. In this phase, 2.46 crore citizens are eligible to vote to decide the electoral fate of 264 candidates.

Union ministers and BJP leaders Piyush Goyal (Mumbai North), Bharti Pawar (Dindori) and Kapil Patil (Bhiwandi), Shiv Sena’s Shrikant Shinde (Kalyan), and Mumbai Congress chief Varsha Gaikwad and BJP candidate and lawyer Ujjwal Nikam (Mumbai North Central seat) are among the prominent candidates in this round.

Apart from these, voting will also take place in Dhule, Nashik, Thane, Palghar, Mumbai North West, Mumbai North East, Mumbai South Central and Mumbai South.

Voting in seven Lok Sabha seats of West Bengal 

Campaigning for the fifth phase of Lok Sabha elections in seven parliamentary constituencies in West Bengal has ended, an election official said.

Voting will be held in Bangaon, Barrackpore, Howrah, Uluberia, Serampur, Hooghly and Arambagh Lok Sabha seats of the state.

In Barrackpore, BJP candidate Arjun Singh is pitted against Partha Bhowmick of the Trinamool Congress and Debdoot Ghosh of the Communist Party of India (Marxist).

Star campaigners including Prime Minister Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee and her nephew and party general secretary Abhishek Banerjee have held rallies for their respective party candidates.

The campaign for the by-elections to three Lok Sabha seats and the Gandey assembly seat in Jharkhand has also ended.

In the fifth phase of Lok Sabha elections, 22 candidates are contesting from Chatra, 15 from Koderma and 17 from Hazaribagh constituency.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP had won these three seats.

Campaigning for 35 seats of Odisha Assembly also ends  

The campaign for five Lok Sabha seats and 35 assembly constituencies in Odisha also ended.

The key candidates in the second phase of the simultaneous Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in the state include BJD president and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and his colleagues in the state government Bikram Arukha, Niranjan Pujari, PK Amat, Tukuni Sahu, Rita Sahu and SP Nayak.

A total of 40 candidates are contesting from Aska, Kandhamal, Bolangir, Bargarh and Sundergarh Lok Sabha seats while 265 candidates are in the fray for 35 assembly constituencies.

Voting for the sixth and seventh phases will be held on May 25 and June 1 respectively.

Counting of votes will take place on June 4.

Also read: