The first phase of the seven phases of India’s marathon general election kicked off this morning in 91 Lok Sabha constituencies spread across 18 states and two Union Territories.
Hundreds and thousands of voters are queuing up from early morning to exercise their right of franchise to elect their representatives to the 17th Lok Sabha, the lower house of India’s bicameral parliament.
The voting started at 9 am and to continue till 6 pm as the voters will cast their votes through EVM machine.
The voting began amid tightened security measurers following Maoist attack in Chhattisgarh state on Tuesday that killed five people including a lawmaker campaigning for Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
A total of 142 million people will vote in 170,664 poll booths to decide the fates of 1,279 candidates. In addition to Lok Sabha elections, the states of Andhra Pradesh and Sikkim will vote for new assemblies today, as will parts of the coastal state of Odisha.
Soon after the polling began, Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged voters, specially mentioning first-time voters, to come out in large numbers and exercise their franchise.
In the first phase, election will be held in 91 constituencies in 18 states and two Union Territories.
Among those, 25 constituencies are in Andhra, two in Arunachal, five in Assam, four in Bihar, one in Chhattisgarh, two in Jammu and Kashmir, seven in Maharastra, two in Meghalaya, one each in Monipur, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, Tripura, Andaman and Lakshadweep, four in Odisha, 17 in Telengana, Eight in Uttor Pradesh, five in Uttarakhand and two in West Bengal.