Holding simultaneous polls for the Lok Sabha and all assemblies would need any no-confidence motion to be coupled with a 'confidence motion' by a leader proposed as next prime minister or chief minister, while any mid-term election can be conducted only for remainder of the term, the Election Commission had said earlier.
Three security personnel suffered injuries in the fierce gun-battle and a large quantity of weapons was also recovered from the spot, the state police said.
A voter turnout of over 40 per cent was recorded till 1 pm on Monday in the fourth phase of Lok Sabha elections in 96 constituencies spread over 10 states and Union Territories amid incidents of violence in Andhra Pradesh and reports of poll boycott in some villages of Uttar Pradesh.
The former Congress president alleged that PM Modi had a "monopoly over corruption".
A high-level committee on Thursday recommended simultaneous elections for Lok Sabha and state assemblies as the first step followed by synchronised local body polls within 100 days.
Taking potshots at the Bharatiya Janata Party, some opposition leaders also wondered if Goel resigned to contest the Lok Sabha polls on its ticket like former Calcutta high court judge Abhijit Gangopadhyay.
In the 2017 assembly election, the voter turnout in the first phase covering the same 89 constituencies stood at 66.75 per cent.
Holding simultaneous elections to Lok Sabha and state assemblies would need at least five constitutional amendments and a large number of additional EVMs and paper-trail machines costing "thousands of crores of rupees", but will yield a huge long-term saving to the public exchequer, officials said on Friday.
In both of these Hindi heartland states, the straight contest between the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and the opposition Congress.
The counting of votes for the Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh polls along with six assembly and one Lok Sabha by-elections will commence at 8 am on Thursday with prohibitory orders in place around counting halls to ensure peace and tranquillity.
Days after Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar undertook an hours-long trek to a remote polling station in Uttarakhand, the poll panel on Tuesday decided to double the remuneration of polling officials going to such booths as early as three days before voting day.
Rajasthan is all set to vote on Saturday to elect members of a new assembly with the Bharatiya Janata Party aiming to unseat the ruling Congress, which is fighting hard to change the trend of alternate governments in the state.
According to the budget document, Rs 1,891.78 crore has been allocated for purchase of EVMs by the poll panel.
Khera told reporters in Hyderabad that the views of the newly-elected MLAs have been elicited and the central leadership is seized of the matter.
4 EVMs and a similar number of VVPATs were found at the house of a TMC leader in West Bengal's Howrah district, following which a poll official was suspended.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday said that polls can be rigged through social media, and that if social media companies want, they can make any party win an election.
The poll watchdog faces two Heruclean tasks -- to produce over a million VVPATs in time for the 2019 elections and also iron out manufacturing tweaks in the machines which are already in use.
The electoral fortunes of top leaders-- Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai of the BJP, Congress heavyweights Siddaramaiah and D K Shivakumar and JD-S' H D Kumaraswamy, among many others will be known on Saturday.
The Supreme Court has made it clear that random matching of VVPAT slips with EVMs will take place in five polling booths per assembly segment. Accordingly, the exercise will be held in 20,600 of the 10.35 lakh polling stations across the country.
Polling is being held for 224 seats in what is being seen mainly as a three-cornered contest between the ruling BJP, the Congress and former prime minister H D Deve Gowda's Janata Dal-Secular.
While the ruling BJP, riding on the Modi juggernaut, wants to break the 38-year jinx and retain its southern citadel, the Congress is seeking to wrest power to give the party much-needed elbow room and momentum to position itself as the main opposition player in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
A total of 833 candidates from 61 political parties, including Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel of the Bharatiya Janata Party, are contesting the polls in these assembly segments spread across Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Gandhinagar and other districts.
An average 59.24 per cent voter turnout was recorded as of 5 pm on Thursday across 89 assembly seats in the first phase of Gujarat elections, officials said.
Campaigning for the first phase of the Gujarat assembly elections to be held on December 1 ended at 5 pm on Tuesday.
The Supreme Court observed on Monday a person making a "false statement" "must know the consequence" as it leads to stalling the electoral process.
Voting is being held in the politically sensitive Kairana in Uttar Pradesh, Palghar and Bhandara-Gondiya and Nagaland Lok Sabha seats.
Jammu and Kashmir has been without an assembly since November 2018 when the then legislative assembly was dissolved by then Governor Satya Pal Malik after the People's Democratic Party-Bharatiya Janata Party coalition government fell apart earlier that year.
The poll panel had ordered for 67,000 additional paper trail units in 2015, out of which 33,500 have been supplied, according to the law ministry.
To clear doubts over EVMs, Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi will soon call all-party meet.
A voter turnout of 72.14 per cent was recorded in Assam till 5 pm on Saturday in the first phase of assembly elections in the state, the Election Commission said.
The commission said polling was held at 15,940 polling stations spread across 44 assembly constituencies in this phase of polls.
The Bharatiya Janata Party, which has ruled Gujarat for 27 years, is trying to retain power in the state for the seventh term in a row.
The announcement came days after it issued a formal direction that VVPAT will be used at polling stations in all future elections where polls are held using EVMs.
The tallying of VVPAT slips with the votes cast and stored in the EVMs will be done to demonstrate that the voting system has been working perfectly.
The clearance to the proposal of "procurement of VVPAT units" was given by the Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi after a brief discussion. The EC has sought Rs 3,174 crore in all for procuring over 16 lakh paper trail machines to cover all polling stations in the country.
The Election Commission, however, termed the allegations 'baseless'.
Voting will be held on Thursday for the first phase of Gujarat Assembly elections in 89 seats spread across 19 districts in Saurashtra-Kutch and southern parts of the state where 788 candidates are in the fray.
Till now, the postal ballots were counted in the beginning followed by votes polled in voting machines.
Sporadic incidents of violence were reported from various places that went to polls on Saturday during the first phase of the West Bengal assembly election, even as the overall poll situation was largely peaceful with 79.79 per cent turnout recorded till the end of voting, an official said.
Rawat also said a legal framework is needed to be in place for holding simultaneous polls.
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