Chennai: The large number of aspirants, 83 to be precise, clearing the scrutiny for the February 27 by-election to the Erode East Assembly constituency portends the engagement of multiple Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) at the 237 polling booths with a very little scope for more withdrawal of nominations, which has be done by 3 pm on Friday.
But for the dummy candidates of the serious aspirants, the remaining contenders for the Assembly seat are likely to remain in the fray to make the polling process cumbersome and time consuming as voters might find it difficult to make their pick from the at least five EVMS (one EVM can accommodate only 16 names) laid out before them.
Apart from Congress candidate E V K S Elangovan, having the backing of the DMK and its allies, and AIADMK’s K S Thennarasu, enjoying the support of the partners of the NDA, only the Naam Tamilar Katchi and DMDK are the popular political parties that have fielded candidates.
So, the rest of the nearly 75 nominations are from members of obscure political parties or independents. Though some of them might have filed their papers at the behest of the major political parties for various reasons, there could be some who would be willing to back out for a small compensation, too.
Backdoor negotiations are said to be happening in some cases with representatives of political parties wanting some of the aspirants to take back their nominations on Friday as their continuing in the fray could cut into the vote share of their official candidates, perhaps in a marginal way.
Otherwise, campaigning has picked up momentum in the constituency with leaders of the DMK and AIADMK landing there for door-to-door canvassing. Apart from AIADMK top honcho Edappadi K Palaniswami addressing a public meeting on Thursday, Chief Minister M K Stalin is expected to seek votes in favour of Elangovan on February 24.
Even DMK Youth Wing secretary and State Minister for Sports and Youth Welfare Udhayanidhi Stalin is touring the constituency on February 19 on behalf of the DMK that has already released the list of ‘star campaigners’ that reads like a who’s who of the DMK top brass.
The TNCC has also released its list of ‘star campaigners’ that has the names of all its top leaders, including MLAs, MPs and other well-known personalities. The AIADMK that announced a 117-member team for the election committee also has a ‘star campaigners’ list but it has already unleashed most of them into the constituency.
Meanwhile, the Chief Electoral Officer, Sathyabrata Sahoo, has urged all media houses to refrain from conducting, publishing and publicizing exit and opinion polls. Quoting Section 126A of the Representation of the People Act, Sahoo said that the print or electronic media had been prohibited from conducting, publishing and publicizing the results of exit polls between 7 am on February 16 to 7 pm on 27 February.
While the AIADMK is targeting the DMK in the run to the polling by accusing the ruling party of reneging on its promises given during the 2021 Assembly elections, though the candidate is from an alliance party, the DMK is highlighting its various welfare schemes.
