Berhampur: Only a few hours are left for elections in the Berhampur Lok Sabha constituency and seven Assembly seats of Chhatrapur, Berhampur, Gopalpur, Chikiti, Digapahandi, Mohana and Paralakhemundi where voting is scheduled Thursday in the first phase.
Campaigning for the first phase of polls ended Tuesday evening and the administration is all set for Thursday’s polling.
The people of Berhampur will vote Thursday to decide the fates of 60 candidates including eight who are contesting for the Lok Sabha seat.
The eight candidates of various parties contesting for the LS seat, including the BJD, the BJP, the Congress and independents, campaigned extensively during the last few days.
The heavyweights who are running for the Lok Sabha are BJD’s Chandra Sekhar Sahu, Congress’s V Chandra Shekhar Rao and the BJP’s Bhrugu Buxipatra.
The Berhampur Assembly seat has the highest number of 10 candidates. There are seven candidates each in Gopalpur, Chikiti, Chhatrapur and Paralakhemundi and eight candidates in Mohana. Digapandi has six.
The leaders fighting for the Berhampur Assembly seat are BJD’s Bikram Panda, BJP’s Kanhu Charan Pati and Congress’ Lingaraj Choudhry.
BJD’s Pradip Panigrahi is contesting from Gopalpur while the BJP has fielded Bibhuti Jena and the Congress S Dharmaraju Reddy against him.
In Chikiti Assembly seat, Usha Devi is fighting for the BJD, Manoranjan Dyansamantray for the BJP and Subash Rout for the Congress.
Digapahandi is set for a triangular contest among BJD heavyweight Suryanarayan Patra, BJP’s new face Pinky Pradhan and Congress’ Prafulla Panda.
The Chhatrapur Assembly seat is set for a triangular fight among BJD’s Subash Chandra Behera, the Congress-CPI alliance candidate Pradip Sethi and BJP’s Prashant Kumar Kar.
Another triangular contest is on the cards among the BJD, the BJP and the Congress at Paralakhemudi and Mohana Assembly seats.
Interestingly, Pintu Das, now in judicial custody and Tirupati Panigrahi are contesting as Independents. Most of the Assembly segments are set for triangular fights.