Bihar records over 31% polling in 4 Lok Sabha seats till 1 pm

Patna/Aurangabad/Gaya: Around 31.47 per cent of the 75 lakh voters in four Lok Sabha constituencies in Bihar have exercised their franchise till 1 pm on Friday, officials said.

The polling began at 7 am and will go on till 6 pm, a senior election official said. The voters will decide the fate of 38 candidates in these four seats.

Tight security arrangements are in place at Nawada and Aurangabad, besides reserved seats of Gaya and Jamui, where a majority of nearly 5,000 polling booths have been marked as "sensitive".

Over 34.25 per cent voters have exercised their franchise in Jamui Lok Sabha constituency, 33.99 per cent in Aurangabad, 30.40 per cent in Gaya and 27.24 per cent in Nawada till 1 pm, officials said.

Earlier in the day, talking to reporters in Gaya, former Bihar chief minister and Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) founder Jitan Ram Manjhi who is contesting from Gaya as an NDA nominee, said, "Voters are coming to cast their votes. Voters are following what our Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said 'pahle matdan, phir jalpan' (First vote, then have breakfast)".

Of the four seats, Nawada has the highest number of 20.06 lakh voters, where altogether eight candidates are in the fray though the contest is primarily between Vivek Thakur, a BJP Rajya Sabha MP seeking entry into the Lok Sabha, and RJD's Shravan Kushwaha.

Gaya has 18.18 lakh voters, but the highest number of 14 candidates. Here, former chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi, an NDA ally, who is just a few months shy of turning 80, is making yet another bid to enter Parliament.