17 people dead on first phase LS polls

16-04-09 The world's largest democratic exercise to vote in a new government began in India on Thursday with voters queuing up in 17 states and union territories in the first phase of staggered elections marred by Maoist violence that left at least 17 people dead.

Election 2009 started at 0700 hrs IST as people voted in 124 constituencies to pick a new 545-seat Lok Sabha in an exercise widely expected to throw up a split verdict.

About 143 million of 714 million voters in the country are eligible to exercise their franchise in the first of five rounds in 185,552 polling centres. A total of 1,715 candidates are in the fray, and over 300,000 electronic voting machines are being used.

Tens of thousands of election staff and security personnel kept vigil to ensure a smooth poll in Kerala, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Chhattisgarh, Andaman and Nicobar Island and Lakshwadeep that saw voting in all constituencies. Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Maharashtra, Manipur, Orissa and Jharkhand saw partial voting.

But it was a bloody start to the ambitious exercise with Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Orissa, Jharkhand and Maharashtra seeing violence and intimidation as Maoist guerrillas tried to implement their election boycott in a hail of bullets and bomb blasts.

At least 17 people were killed as cadres of the outlawed Communist Party of India-Maoist, which seeks to carry out an agrarian-based revolution, targeted polling officials and security personnel across the insurgency hit states.

Landmine blasts in Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand saw at least 14 people getting killed. In Jharkhand's Latehar area, seven Border Security Force (BSF) personnel and two others heading to an election centre were killed when their bus was blown up.

In neighbouring Chhattisgarh, five polling officials died when Maoists detonated a landmine in Rajnandgaon district. A paramilitary trooper was shot dead in an exchange of bullets in the Maoist stronghold Dantewada.

In adjoining Bihar, a policeman and a Home Guard were killed when over a dozen Maoists opened fire at a polling station in Gaya district.

Reports of gun battles, booths being raided, voters being attacked and electronic voting machines being torched came in from several places in the affected states.

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