Voting in Kerala set to take place on April 26

Kerala will vote in a single phase of the upcoming Lok Sabha elections on April 26, the Election Commission of India declared on Saturday.
All 20 Lok Sabha constituencies of the state will see polling on April 26, as part of the second phase of the parliamentary elections, with the votes being counted on June 4.
The issue of notification of the election will be on March 28 while the last date for filing nominations in the state is April 4. The scrutiny of nominations will take place on April 5 and the last date for withdrawal of candidature is April 8. The Lok Sabha elections in the country will be held in seven phases starting on April 19 and concluding on June 1 with the votes being counted on June 4. While some states like West Bengal, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh are voting in seven phases, others like Gujarat, Haryana, Tamil Nadu and Telangana will see single-phase polling. There will be simultaneous polls to state assemblies in Odisha, Arunachal Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Sikkim.
In the 2019 elections in Kerala, the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) had won 19 of the state’s 20 seats with the sole remaining seat going to the CPI(M)-led LDF. The BJP-led NDA polled over 15% of the votes but was unsuccessful in winning a seat. In fact, the saffron party has never won a Lok Sabha seat on its own in the state and will be hoping to open its account this time.
The voter turnout in the 2019 election in Kerala was 77.84%, up nearly 4% from the 2014 election. The UDF won 47.48% of the votes, snatching 19 seats while the Left Democratic Front (LDF) received one seat and 36.29%. The NDA got 15.64% votes and zero seats.
Responding to the announcement of the election schedule, CPM state secretary MV Govindan said there is only a slight change for Kerala in terms of dates compared to 2019. “In 2019, the polling date was April 23 and this time it’s April 26. So there’s not much change. The LDF will use all its political and organisational might to win the 20 seats in Kerala. The fight mainly is between the LDF and the UDF,” he said.
Congress state chief K Sudhakaran said, “We are satisfied with the election dates and we are prepared for the fight. We had already finished all our booth-level activities. Our target is 20 out of 20 seats.”
BJP state chief K Surendran said, “We are very confident that the NDA will do very well in the state this time. The people have taken up PM Modi’s guarantees. Even the LDF convenor admitted that the BJP’s candidates are very good.”