Feature
61% voting in UP fourth phase polls
Lucknow/New Delhi : Over 61 per cent voters exercised their franchise on Thursday across 53 seats in the fourth phase elections to the Uttar Pradesh assembly.
The voting percentage is likely to go up.
“The voting percentage was 61 per cent till 5 pm. We hope it will go up to 63 per cent,” Deputy Election Commissioner Vijay Dev told reporters in New Delhi.
The seats that went to the polls were spread across the Bundelkhand region apart from districts of Allahabad, Koshambi, Pratapgarh and Rae Bareli.
Vijay Dev said the seats had seen 59.9 per cent polling in the 2012 assembly polls and 57.1 per cent in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.
He said the Election Commission had recovered Rs 13.49 crore in cash and liquor worth Rs 8.17 crore in the run up to the polling in the fourth phase.
The voting was slow in the morning but picked up pace as the day progressed.
Other places which saw brisk or high voting included Mahoba, Jhansi, Chitrakoot, Lalitpur and Rae Bareli, the Lok Sabha seat of Congress President Sonia Gandhi.
Skirmishes had erupted in Pratapgarh between Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) activists and in Mahoba between workers of the ruling Samajwadi Party and the BSP.
Samajwadi Party candidate Siddha Gopal Sahu’s son was shot and seriously injured at Mahoba. In Bundelkhand region, people boycotted polling in some villages.
Electronic Voting Machines developed snags in at least a dozen places, disrupting balloting.
Residents of some villages boycotted the polls to protest lack of development and basic amenities.
Among those who cast their vote were West Bengal Governor Keshari Nath Tripathi, BJP state chief Keshav Prasad Maurya and Union Minister Niranjan Jyoti.
The main contest was between the BSP, the BJP and Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance. While the Bahujan Samaj Party contested on all 53 seats, the BJP contested 48 seats and Rashtriya Lok Dal 39. The Samajwadi Party contested 33 and Congress 25.
Samajwadi Party had done well in these constituencies in 2012 election, winning 24 of 53 seats. The Congress had won six seats in the last polls while the BSP had won 15, BJP five and Peace Party three.
Over 1.84 crore voters were eligible to exercise their franchise in the election.
As many as 680 candidates were in the fray including the maximum 26 from the Allahabad North constituency. There were 61 women candidates.
Prominent candidates whose electoral fate was decided on Thursday included Utkarsha Mishra, son of former Leader of Opposition in the outgoing assembly Swamy Prasad Maurya; Independent Raghuraj Pratap Singh aka Raja Bhaiyya; Aradhna Mishra, daughter of Rajya Sabha member Pramod Tiwari; and Ujjwal Raman Singh, son of senior Samajwadi Party leader, Reoti Raman Singh.
Sonia Gandhi, who has not campaigned for the Uttar Pradesh assembly polls this time due to ill health, on Thursday made an appeal to the people of Amethi and Rae Bareli through a video message to vote for the Congress.
Her message came a day after she sent out an appeal to voters in a letter.
Uttar Pradesh is witnessing a seven-phased election to 402 of 403 seats (election on one seat has been countermanded) which will conclude on March 8.
The State Scores Extra High on Gaming-Friendly Industry Index
Meghalaya scored 92.85 out of 100 possible points in a Gaming Industry Index and proved to be India’s most gaming-friendly state following its recent profound legislation changes over the field allowing land-based and online gaming, including games of chance, under a licensing regime.
The index by the UK India Business Council (UKIBC) uses a scale of 0 to 100 to measure the level of legalisation on gambling and betting achieved by a state based on the scores over a set of seven different games – lottery, horse racing, betting on sports, poker, rummy, casino and fantasy sports
Starting from February last year, Meghalaya became the third state in India’s northeast to legalise gambling and betting after Sikkim and Nagaland. After consultations with the UKIBC, the state proceeded with the adoption of the Meghalaya Regulation of Gaming Act, 2021 and the nullification of the Meghalaya Prevention of Gambling Act, 1970. Subsequently in December, the Meghalaya Regulation of Gaming Rules, 2021 were notified and came into force.
All for the Tourists
The move to legalise and license various forms of offline and online betting and gambling in Meghalaya is aimed at boosting tourism and creating jobs, and altogether raising taxation revenues for the northeastern state. At the same time, the opportunities to bet and gamble legally will be reserved only for tourists and visitors.
“We came out with a Gaming Act and subsequently framed the Regulation of Gaming Rules, 2021. The government will accordingly issue licenses to operate games of skill and chance, both online and offline,” said James P. K. Sangma, Meghalaya State Law and Taxation Minister speaking in the capital city of Shillong. “But the legalized gambling and gaming will only be for tourists and not residents of Meghalaya,” he continued.
To be allowed to play, tourists and people visiting the state for work or business purposes will have to prove their non-resident status by presenting appropriate documents, in a process similar to a bank KYC (Know Your Customer) procedure.
Meghalaya Reaches Out to a Vast Market
With 140 millions of people in India estimated to bet regularly on sports, and a total of 370 million desi bettors around prominent sporting events, as per data from one of the latest reports by Esse N Videri, Meghalaya is set to reach out and take a piece of a vast market.
Estimates on the financial value of India’s sports betting market, combined across all types of offline channels and online sports and cricket predictions and betting platforms, speak about amounts between $130 and $150 billion (roughly between ₹9.7 and ₹11.5 lakh crore).
Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Delhi are shown to deliver the highest number of bettors and Meghalaya can count on substantial tourists flow from their betting circles. The sports betting communities of Karnataka, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana are also not to be underestimated.
Among the sports, cricket is most popular, registering 68 percent of the total bet count analyzed by Esse N Videri. Football takes second position with 11 percent of the bets, followed by betting on FIFA at 7 percent and on eCricket at 5 percent. The last position in the Top 5 of popular sports for betting in India is taken by tennis with 3 percent of the bet count.
Local Citizens will Still have Their Teer Betting
Meghalaya residents will still be permitted to participate in teer betting over arrow-shooting results. Teer is a traditional method of gambling, somewhat similar to a lottery draw, and held under the rules of the Meghalaya Regulation of the Game of Arrow Shooting and the Sale of Teer Tickets Act, 2018.
Teer includes bettors wagering on the number of arrows that reach the target which is placed about 50 meters away from a team of 20 archers positioned in a semicircle.
The archers shoot volleys of arrows at the target for ten minutes, and players place their bets choosing a number between 0 and 99 trying to guess the last two digits of the number of arrows that successfully pierce the target.
If, for example, the number of hits is 256, anyone who has bet on 56 wins an amount eight times bigger than their wager.
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