Anantnag, May 05: The prestigious Anantnag parliamentary constituency, which goes to polls today, is set to witness a direct contest between scions of two south Kashmir leaders -- Mehbooba Mufti, daughter of Mufti Mohammad Sayeed and Dr Mehboob Baigh, son of Mirza Afzal Baigh. An electorate of 10,22,271, including 48,642 new voters, will exercise their democratic right at 1,049 polling booths spread over 16 assembly segments in the twin South Kashmir districts of Anantnag and Pulwama.
However, because of threat perception all the polling booths have been declared sensitive and hypersensitive.
There is not a single normal polling station in the constituency, an official spokesman told news agencies. He said that all arrangements have been made for conducting free and fair elections.
Special polling booths have been set up at Udhampur, Jammu and Delhi for the migrant voters of the constituency.



The authorities have made adequate security arrangements for the polling station, officials and voters. A total of 5,229 polling staff has been deployed to conduct the polls smoothly. Of them about 1,270 employees will be from other districts of the valley.



In Pulwama district alone, 414 presiding officers, 1,242 polling officers, six zonal magistrates and 12 sectoral magistrates will be deployed on election duty.


The poll staff has already been despatched to far flung areas with EVM and other poll materials. Polling staff have taken over the polling booths at all places, officials said.



Returning Officer of the constituency Rohit Kansal told news agencies that no security personnel of the contesting candidate or VIP will be allowed to enter with arms within a range of 200 metres of the polling booth.



The constituency has been represented by the National Conference (NC) and the Congress four times each while Janata Dal has won once from here.?


Bureau Report