Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday urged the people of Gujarat, particularly youths and women, to exercise their voting rights in large numbers in the second phase of the Assembly elections in the state which will begin at 8 am.

The Prime Minister said that he will cast his vote in Ahmedabad at around 9 am. "Urging all those who are voting in Phase 2 of the Gujarat elections, particularly the young voters and women voters to vote in large numbers. I will be casting my vote in Ahmedabad at around 9 AM," PM Modi tweeted.
PM Modi will exercise his franchise at Nishan School, Ranip in Ahmedabad.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah will also cast his vote in the second phase in Ahmedabad today.

Polling in the second and final phase will be conducted for 93 Assembly constituencies across 14 districts of north and central Gujarat. As many as 833 candidates from 61 parties are in the fray in the second phase of the Gujarat elections whose fate will be decided by over 2.51 crore electorates.

The Election Commission has established 26,409 polling booths and nearly 36,000 Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) will be used for the purpose. Around 29,000 presiding officers and over 84,000 polling officers have been deployed in 14 districts to facilitate the polls.

According to Gujarat's Chief Electoral Officer P Bharathi, of the total 26,409 polling stations, 93 are model polling booths, 93 are eco-friendly booths, another 93 are managed by Divyang and 14 are managed by youth. Webcasting will be done in 13,319 polling booths in the second phase.

"Total of 2,51,58,730 voters will vote, of which, 1,29,26,501 are men, 1,22,31,335 are women and 894 are from the third gender," Bharathi said.(ANI)