UP Elections Live: 22.84% recorded till 11 am

• The voter turnout was recorded at 22.84 percent recorded till 11 am
  
• A 65-year old woman died before casting her vote at Mughalsarai assembly constituency.
  
• The Election Commission (EC) has prohibited exit polls for the UP Polls till 5.30 pm on 9 March.
  

Farmers boycott the elections at polling booth number 283 of the Chunar assembly alleging lack of irrigation facilities and development.

The voter turnout was recorded at 22.84 percent recorded till 11 am in 7th phase of polling in UP.

BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi casts his vote at booth number 76 of Varanasi North.

Special arrangements were made for women at polling booth no 394 in Aurai (Bhadohi).

A 65-year old woman died before casting her vote at polling booth number 357 of Mughalsarai assembly constituency.

A voter turnout of 10.43% was recorded till 9 am in the 7th phase of UP elections 2017.

Apna Dal leader and Union Minister Anupriya Patel cast her vote at Mirzapur. After voting she confidently said:

Congress leader Ajai Rai casts his vote at polling booth no. 389 of Varanasi South. He said:

After an hour of dealing with a technical glitch in two booths, voting has begun at in Chandauli in Sakaldiha constituency.

People started queueing up outside polling booths at Varanasi where BJP’s Ravindra Jaiswal and BSP’s Sujit Kumar Maurya is contesting from.

Varanasi has been the much sought after constituency, since PM Modi contested from this constituency during the General Election.

The Election Commission (EC) has prohibited exit polls for the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections till 5.30 pm on 9 March following the death of the Samajwadi Party candidate for the Alapur seat, in the wake of which polling, originally scheduled for 27 February, has been pushed back to Thursday, an official said.

A polling booth at Mirzapur faced technical glitches, due to which people couldn’t cast their votes.

People started casting their votes at the Mohammadabad constituency where BSP candidate Shibakatullah is contesting from.

Voters queue up at polling booths 176,177,178 in Mirzapur to cast their vote in the last phase of Uttar Pradesh elections.

Less than 24 hours before the final phase, an encounter between the anti-terrorist squad (ATS) and a suspected ISIS terrorist took place in Thakurganj area of Lucknow.

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The BJP is contesting 32 seats and its allies the Apana Dal and the Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party are contesting on four seats each. The BSP has fielded its nominees for all seats. While the SP is contesting 31 seats, its ally the Congress is in race for the remaining seats.

In the 2012 state Assembly polls, out of these 40 seats, 23 went to the SP, 5 to the BSP, 4 to the BJP, 3 to the Congress and 5 to others.

Prominent candidates who are in fray include former Cabinet minister Om Prakash, Parasnath Yadav, Ajay Rai, former MP Dhananjay Singh, Sigbatullah Ansari brother of Mukhtar Ansari and Seema Singh, wife of jailed mafia Munna Bajrangi.

Also Read: ‘Izzat Ko Beizzat Mat Karo’: Women Demand Toilets This UP Election

The stage is set for the grand finale to the staggered UP Assembly polls as the seventh and the last phase covering 40 seats will be held today, with all eyes on the Prime Minister’s Lok Sabha constituency Varanasi.

Three Naxal-affected districts of Sonbhadra, Mirzapur and Chandauli, along with the five Assembly segments under Varanasi Lok Sabha constituency, will be in prime focus. Ghazipur, Jaunpur and Bhadoi are the other districts going to polls in this phase. Tight security has been put in place in these seven districts.

A total of 1.41 crore voters, including 64.76 lakh women, are eligible to exercise their franchise in 14,458 polling booths. A total 1.4 crore people will vote for 535 candidates. This includes around 65 lakh female voters and 706 from the third gender.

The average assets of 311 MLAs recontesting in Uttar Pradesh went up by Rs 2.84 crore – roughly an increase of 82 percent – in the last five years, says a report.

The average assets of the 311 re-contesting MLAs from various parties in 2012 was Rs 3.49 crore (Rs 3,49,08,073) while this year, it stood at Rs 6.33 crore (Rs 6,33,64,781), a report by think-tank Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) said on Tuesday.