Assembly elections: Punjab, Goa vote heavily

Goa registered a record 83% voter turnout with no incidents of violence

Punjab and Goa on Saturday voted heavily with an estimated 70 per cent and a record-breaking 83 per cent turnout, respectively, as the first round of assembly elections in five states concluded by and large peacefully, Election Commission said.
 
BJP and Congress are locked in an electoral battle in the two states where Arvind Kejriwal's AAP has made its maiden foray in assembly elections, seeking to play a killjoy for the two major contenders for power. BJP is Bharatiya Janata Party, AAP is Aam Aadmi Party.
 
It is the first outing for AAP in assembly elections outside Delhi where it rules with an overwhelming majority in the state assembly and all eyes will be on it to see if it can upset the apple cart of the two major national parties.

 

BJP has been in government in Punjab in alliance with Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) for two successive terms, while it also helms Goa, despite ally Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party having drifted away just after the announcement of elections to form a three-party combine.
 
The elections to Punjab and Goa, which will be followed by those in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and Manipur, beginning later this month and spilling over to March, are being billed as a major test of BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi's popularity after demonetisation.
 
Barring minor skirmishes and technical glitches in electronic voting machines and voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) machines, which delayed voting for some time, polling passed off peacefully in Punjab where nearly 79 per cent electors had cast their votes in the 2012 polls.

 
In Punjab, where SAD-BJP alliance has been in power for the past decade, Saturday's polling will decide the fate of a number of political bigwigs, including
 
89-year-old chief minister Parkash Singh Badal, seeking a sixth term in office, his old political rival and Congress’s CM face Amarinder Singh, who has declared it will be his last election, and Badal's son and deputy Sukhbir.
 
Badal Senior is locked in a battle with Amarinder for the Lambi seat, the pocket borough of the Badals. Amarinder, the scion of Patiala royal family, is also in the fray from his home town, where ready to give him a run for his money is the former army chief J J Singh of SAD.

 
Stand-up comedian and AAP member of Parliament from Sangrur, Bhagwant Mann, who is a probable candidate for chief ministership if the party wins the election, is crossing swords with Sukhbir in Jalalabad. Navjot Singh Sidhu, the cricketer-turned-politician, who quit BJP to join Congress just ahead of the polls, is trying his luck from Amritsar East seat, part of his former parliamentary constituency Amritsar.
 
The other prominent candidates include Congress veteran and former Chief Minister Rajinder Kaur Bhattal (Lehragagga), Indian Youth Congress Chief Raja Amarinder Singh Warring (Gidderbaha), Badal's estranged nephew Manpreet Singh Badal on Congress ticket (Bathinda Urban).

 
Goa registered a record 83 per cent voter turnout with no incidents of violence and very little technical problem reported in the EVMs and VVPAT machines. In the 2012 assembly elections, Goa had recorded an impressive 81.8 per cent voting.
 
Goa, where chief ministership has been as fickle as the loyalties of its political leaders, today's vote will decide the fate among others of five former CM's, besides incumbent Laxmikant Parsekar.
 
While Ravi Naik, Digambar Kamat, Pratapsinh Rane and Luizinho Faleiro are in the fray as Congress nominees, Churchill Alemao is contesting on NCP ticket. The electoral fate of AAP's chief ministerial face Elvis Gomes, a former bureaucrat, will also be decided.