After days of high-intensity campaigning, Kerala, Assam and Puducherry entered a crucial polling day on Thursday, April 9, with crores of voters set to decide who will form the next governments in the three regions.
In Kerala, nearly 2.71 crore voters are deciding the fate of 883 candidates contesting across 140 Assembly constituencies. According to Election Commission data, the electorate comprises around 1.32 crore men, 1.39 crore women and 273 transgender persons. The state also has more than 2.42 lakh overseas voters registered for the elections.
In Assam, voting began across all 126 Assembly constituencies to determine the electoral prospects of 722 candidates. The state has an electorate of about 2.50 crore people, including 1.25 crore women and 318 voters from the third gender. Polling is being conducted at 31,490 stations spread across the state.
Meanwhile, polling commenced under tight security in the Union Territory of Puducherry, where around 9.50 lakh voters are set to decide the fortunes of candidates from the ruling NDA and the opposition INDIA bloc. The electorate is distributed across Puducherry, which has 23 Assembly segments, Karaikal with five segments, and Mahe and Yanam with one constituency each. Officials said there are a total of 1,099 polling stations in the Union Territory, of which 209 have been identified as vulnerable. A total of 294 candidates are in the fray.
As polling progressed, BJP national president Nitin Nabin urged voters in Kerala, Assam and Puducherry to turn out in large numbers and vote for progress and development. In Kerala, Minister P. Rajeev cast his vote at the Ambedkar Training Centre in Vidya Nagar Colony. BJP Kerala president Rajeev Chandrasekhar also exercised his franchise in Thiruvananthapuram.
Early trends showed steady participation, with Assam recording a voter turnout of 17.87% in the first two hours of polling, while nearly 16% of Kerala’s electorate had cast their votes during the same period. Voting began at 8 am after the completion of mock polling exercises at all stations.
