Delhi is set to witness the much-awaited counting of votes for its seven Lok Sabha seats on Tuesday.
The counting of votes is scheduled to commence at 8 am across the seven constituencies of Delhi amid elaborate security arrangements. The polling in the national capital was held in the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha polls on May 25.
According to the Election Commission of India (ECI), Delhi recorded a total voter turnout of 58.69 per cent. The polling across all the seven constituencies passed off smoothly and peacefully.
Amid heatwave conditions in the national capital, Delhi went to polls on May 25 in a single phase on all seven seats in a close contest between the BJP and the Opposition INDIA bloc, comprising the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and Congress.
The AAP and Congress contested the seven seats in alliance in the national capital, with the AAP contesting four and the Congress three seats. The seven parliamentary constituencies are Chandni Chowk, East Delhi, New Delhi, North East Delhi, North West Delhi, South Delhi, and West Delhi.
The number of candidates for the seven Lok Sabha constituencies was 162.
Key candidates who contested the polls from the BJP are Manoj Tiwari (North East Delhi), Bansuri Swaraj (New Delhi); Ramvir Singh Bidhuri (South Delhi) while J P Agarwal (Chandni Chowk), and Kanhaiya Kumar (North East Delhi) contested on Congress tickets. Another prominent candidate is senior AAP leader Somnath Bharti (New Delhi).
Meanwhile, the poll panel assured robust security arrangements for the polled EVMs and the VVPATs in the NCT of Delhi, Delhi Chief Electoral Officer P Krishnamurthy said. The candidates can closely monitor the security arrangements of the strong rooms, the CEO’s office had said earlier.
The CEO’s office informed about the deployment of two-tier security around the clock, with the innermost perimeter guarded by Central Armed Paramilitary Forces (CAPF) and the outermost perimeter by State Armed Police will be in place and a 24×7 CCTV camera coverage of the sealed doors of the strong rooms and corridors will also be there for continuous monitoring.