Notification for 1st phase of C'garh polls on Tuesday

Notification for the first phase of Chhattisgarh Assembly election covering 18 seats across eight districts of the state, will be issued on October 16.

With the notification, filing of nominations would commence. Chief Electoral officer Subrat Sahoo said in the first phase, seven districts of Bastar revenue division having 12 Assembly constituencies and six Assembly constituencies of Rajnandgaon district would go to the polls in the first phase.

Sahoo said the 18 constituencies have 31.79 lakh voters, of whom 16,21,839 are women, 15,57,592 men and 89 third gender voters. As many as 4,336 polling centres have been readied.

The last date for filing nomination is October 23. Scrutiny of papers will be on October 24 and candidates can withdraw their nomination till October 26, 3.00 pm. Polling will be held on November 12. The counting of votes is on December 11.

Extremism hit areas

The seats going to polls are: In Bastar division, Sukma (in Sukma district), Bijapur (Bijapur), Dantewada (Dantewada), Chitrakote, Bastar and Jagdalpur (Bastar), Narayanpur (Narayanpur), Keshkal and Kondagaon (Kondagaon), Antagarh, Bhanupratappur and Kanker (Kanker), Khairagarh, Dongargarh, Rajnandgaon, Dongargaon, Khujji and Mohala-Manpur Assembly seats (in Rajnandgaon district).

As the first phase covers Left Wing Extremism infested areas, the polling time will vary. According to information available, for 10 seats the polling would be held from 7 am to 3 pm and for the remaining 8 seats polling would be held from 8 am to 5 pm.