Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, December 10 2008:
It is going to a straight fight between the Congress and MPP in the bye-election to the Moirang Assembly Constituency which is slated on December 27 .
Steps have also been taken up to deploy only para-military forces in all the polling stations.
According to an official of the State Election Department, till the last day of filing the nomination papers today, candidates of no other political parties with exception to Mairembam Prithiviraj of Congress party and Hemam Bir Singh of MPP have submitted the nominations thus paving the way for a straight fight between the Congress and the MPP.
The scrutiny of the nomination papers would be carried out tomorrow and December 13 has been fixed as the date of withdrawal of nomination paper.
However, in the emerging scenario, no of the two aspiring candidates are likely to withdraw their nomination.
Even though the Election Commission had announced December 3 to 10 as the timing for filing the nomination papers, only the Congress and the MPP submitted the nomination papers of their respective candidates today only.
Prithiviraj who is going to contest in the bye-election as Congress candidate for the first time is the son of late Mairembam Manindra, the sitting MLA whose demise has necessitated the conduct of the bye-election while the MPP candidate Bir Singh has contested in the election twice but had come in second place always.
In all the 37 polling stations of the Constituency, only paramilitary forces would be deployed on the day of the polling while the State forces would be deployed at 100 metre periphery of the polling stations and no commando personnel and SP would be permitted to enter the polling stations.
Polling station no.2/3 has been declared the hypersensitive and the rest sensitive.
Ravindra Telang and Manjit Singh who have been appointed as Central observers for the bye-election by the Election Commission are expected to arrive at Imphal either on December 12 or 13 .
A total of 32,059 voters including 15,161 male and 16,898 female would be exercising their franchise in the bye-election.
After conducting the election on December 27, counting of the votes would be done on December 30 and the entire election process is to be completed on January 1, 2009 .