Tamil Nadu: Voting for Erode Assembly seat bypoll underway smoothly

Erode (Tamil Nadu) [India], February 27 (ANI): The voting for the tightly-contested Erode East bypoll is underway smoothly across the constituency, officials said on Monday.

The election began at 7 am. The officials are also monitoring the situation across all polling booths. While talking to ANI, Returning Officer, Sivakumar said, “Everything is going well across the constituency. From our office, we are monitoring the situation across all polling booths.”

Voting for the Erode East Assembly bye-election began at Mahajana school, Agrahara street on Monday.
Significantly, a total of 77 candidates across political affiliations are vying for the prized Assembly constituency.

However, the bypoll is being essentially seen as a tight race between Congress candidate EVKS Elangovan and AIADMK’s Thennarasu.
Elangovan is contesting the bypoll with the support of the DMK, which is also Congress’ bigger partner in the ruling alliance.

After the recent Supreme Court ruling, which allowed him to remain at the helm of the AIADMK, former Tamil Nadu chief minister Edappadi Palaniswami has a chance to emerge as a tall leader and reaffirm his hold on the party if the outcome of the Erode bypoll goes his way.

However, the AIADMK faces a stiff contest from the ruling DMK in the battle for the prized seat, with the Naam Tamizlar Katchi (NTK), the Desiya Morpokku Dravida Kazhagam (DMDK) and several other players also in the fray.
A total of 1206 officers, 286 presiding officers, 858 polling officers and 62 additional officers, have been stationed for poll duty.

As many as 238 polling centres have been set up across 52 places.
The bypoll was necessitated after the sudden demise of Congress MLA Thirumahan Eveera.