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Gujarat Election 2022: 56.88% voter turnout till 5pm

The BJP is confident and claims its haul of seats this time will break all records. The party has denied tickets to 42 of its sitting MLAs. It has to contend with 19 rebels, nine of whom are in the race in the first phase.

Gujarat Election 2022: Voting underway for Phase 1 covering 89 seats AJR
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First Published Dec 1, 2022, 8:00 AM IST

Voting for the first phase of Gujarat assembly election is underway in which the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is looking for a record seventh successive term. As many as 89 assembly constituencies go to polls on Thursday, December 1, 2022.

The entry of Arvind Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has made the Gujarat election, which used to be a straight fight between the BJP and Congress, a triangular contest.

Some key constituencies in the first phase include Surat, Porbandar, Khambhalia, Rajkot, Jamnagar North, and Morbi - the site of the bridge collapse incident that claimed the lives of over 140 people in October.

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In the first phase, as many as 788 candidates are in the fray across 19 districts of South Gujarat and Kutch-Saurashtra region. Of these, 70 candidates are women and 339 are independents.

Of the 2,39,76,670 voters who can exercise their franchise in the first phase, 1,24,33,362 are male, 1,15,42,811 are female and 497 are third-gender voters.

Meanwhile, the Election Commission of India (ECI) has set up as many as 25,430 polling booths for phase one, of which 16,416 are in rural areas and 9,014 are in urban areas.

It can be seen that the BJP is confident and claims its haul of seats this time will break all records. The party has denied tickets to 42 of its sitting MLAs. It has to contend with 19 rebels, nine of whom are in the race in the first phase.

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The BJP's main task, which has ruled the state since 1995, is to arrest the declining numbers. The party's score has declined since 2002, falling from 137 to 99 in the 2018 election.

AAP has fielded 181 candidates and announced former journalist Isudan Gadhvi as its chief ministerial candidate. The party has pitched itself as the BJP rival.

The second phase of voting for the 182-member assembly will be held on December 5 and the votes counted on December 8.

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