Lok Sabha Polls: Voting Begins For Six Seats In Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Meghalaya And Manipur

An additional 20 companies of central paramilitary forces besides 24 existing companies have been deployed as well as 8,000 policemen to maintain law and order during the polls. All the inter-state check gates have been sealed till 5pm.

The state capital is experiencing moderate rains since last night. The state government has declared a holiday today to enable voters to exercise their franchise.

Meghalaya
Polling for two Lok Sabha seats in Meghalaya also began on a peaceful note in the second phase of the election.

Congress, BJP, former Lok Sabha speaker PA Sangma's National Peoples Party, regional party United Democratic Party (UDP) besides independents supported by small regional parties will fight it out in a multi-cornered contest in Shillong and Tura seats.

Sangma, who has won the Tura seat eight out of ten times, is pitted in a straight fight against Congress candidate Daryl Momin for the seat.

In Shillong, a total of eight contestants are in the fray, including the sitting Congress MP Vincent Pala, UDP candidate former student leader Paul Lyngdoh, BJP nominee Shibun Lyngdoh besides church leader PBM Basaiawmoit, who is fighting as an independnent.

Congress has won Shillong seat seven times between 1977 and 2009, with an unbroken stint in the seat since 1996. Of the 15,53,028-strong electorate, 7,83,270 are women and outnumber men by 13,512.

There are 343 sensitive polling booths out of 2,562, of which 85 per cent are in the militant-hit Garo Hills region and classified as hyper sensitive. Polling stations along the international border with Bangladesh and inter-state border with Assam are also classified as such.

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