Dehradun: Uttarakhand DGP Abhinav Kumar on Wednesday said that adequate security arrangements have been made for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.
The Lok Sabha elections for all five Lok Sabha seats in Uttarakhand are scheduled to take place in a single phase on April 19.
Speaking to ANI, Uttarakhand DGP Abhinav Kumar said, "On April 19, polling will be held simultaneously in all 5 Lok Sabha seats of Uttarakhand. The election campaign in the state will end at 5 pm today, 48 hours before the polls. The police department has made full preparations."
"There are 11,729 polling stations in Uttarakhand, out of which about 1,100 have been kept in the category of hyper-sensitive, the rest have been kept in the normal category. We have deployed the Central Police Force, Home Guard along with local police and a total of 46,000 police personnel will be deployed to conduct this polling process," he further said.
The DGP said that Uttarakhand has a history of conducting peaceful elections and this year also, the police will ensure the smooth conduct of the elections in the state. Earlier, on Tuesday, the state's Chief Electoral Officer, BVR Purushottam said that the Indo-Nepal border will be sealed from April 16 and cross-border movement of people will be closed till April 19.
"On April 19, the first round of voting will take place in 21 states. In Uttarakhand also, the elections are in the first phase. The Indo-Nepal border will be sealed today and cross-border movement of people will be closed till 6:00 pm on April 19, BVR Purushottam said." The election officer further added, "This time, a good thing is that along with UP, seven more bordering districts are witnessing elections together with Uttarakhand... This time, we have got around 60 companies of paramilitary forces for elections. And we believe that we will conduct peaceful elections."
The officer also talked about directing the political parties and candidates to stop their campaigns two days before the voting and assured that there would be no breach of the Model Code of Conduct (MCC). "We have directed all candidates to stop campaigning 48 hours before the polls. The static and surveillance teams will be conducting thorough checks. We will ensure that there is no violation of MCC," he said. Notably, campaigning for the first phase of polling will end on Wednesday. The BJP has fielded Mala Rajya Laxmi Shah, Anil Baluni, Ajay Tamta, Ajay Bhatt, and Trivendra Singh Rawat for these seats. Uttarakhand has been a hotly contested terrain for the BJP and Congress. Earlier in the 2014 and 2019 general elections, the ruling BJP-led NDA clinched victory across all Lok Sabha constituencies. —ANI
