New Delhi, May 4
The crucial third phase of polling in 83 Lok Sabha constituencies, including the Lucknow seat from where Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee is contesting will take place tomorrow.

The Election Commission has issued shoot-at-sight orders in Bihar and tight security arrangements have been made to prevent electoral mal-practice in seven states — mostly in the Hindi belt — where polling will be held on Wednesday.

Prominent personalities in the fray include UP Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav, Union Ministers Murli Manohar Joshi, Sharad Yadav, Shahnawaz Hussain, Digvijay Singh, Subhash Maharia and Prahlad Patel.

As many as 90,000 personnel of central para-military forces in addition to local police will stand guard at 1,08,615 polling booths, out of which 25,516 have been declared sensitive and 19,835 designated hyper-sensitive to ensure incident-free poll.

Nearly 33,000 CRPF and BSF personnel will be deployed in Jammu and Kashmir’s Anantnag constituency where ruling PDP Chief Mehbooba Mufti is in the fray against CPI(M) leader Yusuf Tarigami. Out of 1049 polling booths in the constituency, 378 have been declared sensitive and 666 super sensitive.

Shoot-at-sight orders have been issued to prevent possible booth capturing in Bihar and the Indo-Nepal border has been sealed while the Election Commsision has ordered videography in 14 seats of UP, including Lucknow, Mainpuri, Kannauj, where Mulayam Singh Yadav’s son Akhilesh Yadav is in the fray.

Polling tomorrow will cover 30 out of 80 seats in Uttar Pradesh, 25 seats in Rajasthan, 12 out of 29 constituencies in Madhya Pradesh, the last 12 of 40 seats in Bihar, one each in J and K and Nagaland and two in Arunachal Pradesh.

Tomorrow’s election will complete the polling in Bihar, Rajasthan, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh. While polling so far has covered 278 constituencies, the last phase on May 10 will cover 183 constituencies in 16 states and Union Territories as also the 32-member Sikkim state Assembly. Counting of votes will be taken up on May 13.

Agencies add: A poll personnel was shot at and critically wounded by unidentified gunmen at Machchali Talab, near Munger (Bihar), today.

The gunmen fired at Rajendra Sahni while he was on way to a booth for poll duty, the police said.

Seventeen persons have been injured in clashes between BJP and Congress workers at two places in Chhindwara constituency of Madhya Pradesh, which is also witnessing a confrontation between AICC General Secretary Kamal Nath and Union Minister of State for Coal Prahlad Patel (BJP).

The police said the clashes occurred last night at Harrai and Tamia area and that some of the victims had to be hospitalised. Both political parties have lodged complaints with the police.