Sonia,Advani in fray for the 3rd phase of polls

Polling would be held amid tight security in 1.65 lakh booths from 0700 hrs across nine states and two union territories.

Congress president Sonia Gandhi is seeking re-election from the Lok Sabha constituency of Rae Barelli. She had moved to this seat from Amethi in 2004 when her son Rahul Gandhi entered the election arena. Rae Barelli was represented by her mother-in-law late Indira Gandhi in 1980.

Advani,who has been named the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate,has represented Gandhinagar seat since 1991. Prominent candidates in the fray in the third phase include JD-U chief Sharad Yadav,Congress’ Milind Deora and Priya Dutt,Shiv Sena’s Mohan Rawle,BJP leaders Ram Naik and Kirit Somaiya,former Karnataka chief minister S Bangarappa,union ministers Sriprakash Jaiswal and Jyotiraditya Scindia and actor-turned-politician Ambareesh.

Polling for 26 Lok Sabha seats in Gujarat will be completed in one go.

Besides Gujarat,polling will be held in 16 seats in Madhya Pradesh,15 in Uttar Pradesh,14 in West Bengal,11 each in Bihar and Karnataka,10 in Maharashtra and one each in Jammu and Kashmir,Sikkim,Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu.

Sikkim has 32 assembly seats,of which one is reserved for the Sangha monks,who number 3,058. The results will be out on May 16. The five-round general elections began on April 16 and so far polling has been completed to 265 Lok Sabha seats to the 545-member house.

Elections are held only to 543 seats,as two members are nominated from the Anglo-Indian community. Even as the country prepared for the third phase of elections,the Congress found itself pounded by the Bofors episode with opposition parties accusing the government of giving Italian businessman Ottavio Quattrocchi a clean chit three weeks before it bows out of office.

After remaining dormant for several years,the Bofors issue returned to the centre stage of politics with Interpol dropping the Red Corner Notice against the only surviving suspect in the controversial payoff case at the behest of CBI.

Grabbing the opportunity to slam the government,Advani held Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress President Gandhi “guilty” for the CBI decision and said that the party will reopen all political cases if it comes to power.

Law Minister H R Bhardwaj defended the government,saying the Centre has no role in CBI asking Interpol to drop Quattrocchi’s name from the wanted list.

Hostilities in Sri Lanka has become another hot political issue in the past few days with southern parties DMK and the AIADMK trying to score over each other on the matter ahead of the single phase polling in Tamil Nadu on May 13.

While Chief Minister M Karunanidhi resorted to a fast,AIADMK supremo Jayalalithaa firmly backed a separate Tamil Eelam saying it alone would end the decades-long ethnic strife in the island nation.

With the clamour for the Prime Minister’s chair getting louder,CPI-M and BJP,known detractors of Manmohan Singh,have become strange bedfellows despite being poles apart ideologically.

The two parties favour that the next Prime Minister should be from the Lok Sabha,a move apparently aimed at scuttling a second term for Singh,who is a member of the Rajya Sabha.

CPM leader Prakash Karat,spearheading the Third Front initiative,has said that post-elections the Left parties will back a Lok Sabha member for the post of Prime Minister.

BJP’s candidate for the top post L K Advani has gone to the extent of suggesting a constitutional amendment to ensure that Prime Minister should be only from the Lok Sabha.