THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: On the eve of the Aruvikkara byelection, squads of rival parties moved door to door, trying to contact the maximum number of voters individually.
The squads of the UDF, LDF and BJP conducted door-to-door campaign, distributing slips and marking their vacillating and unsure votes on the electoral rolls itself.
The exercise is aimed at getting an idea of the votes that they are going to poll and also last-minute bid to convince the unsure ones.
The constituency spread across eight panchayats has 153 booths and an auxiliary booth. The cadres of rival fronts began capturing the vantage points outside the stipulated area for setting up their kiosks.
Meanwhile, the prominent candidates — UDF’s K. S. Sabarinathan, LDF’s M. Vijayakumar and BJP’s O. Rajagopal — conducted silent campaign, meeting a cross section of voters in the constituency.
The UDF, which invoked the memory of late G. Karthikeyan in a big way throughout its campaign, is expecting the sympathy factor to help his son, Sabarinathan.
Despite a series of corruption charges including solar and bar bribe issue, the chief minister is confident of getting positive votes for his development and care agenda besides the decision to close down bars. The chief minister had attended over 200 family meets.
The LDF, which tried to overcome the sympathy factor by campaigning hard on the corruption issue, expects a political vote against the UDF government.
It is also pinning its hopes on the high-voltage campaign of V. S. Achuthanandan that had brought the corruption agenda back to the centre stage.
The booth-level management under the leadership of CPM politburo member Pinarayi Vijayan is also one of the factors that the Left is banking heavily on.
The BJP, which has put up its strongest candidate Rajagopal in the fray, is confident of a good show in the election.
The party is also resting its hopes on the huge public meetings and road shows led by actor Suresh Gopi. BJP is hopeful that a big section of people who attended the Suresh Gopi show would vote for its candidate.
Political observers say the presence of a strong candidate like Rajagopal could pose problems to LDF while a better show by P. C. George’s ACDF might go against UDF.
Karthikeyan had won the seat in 2011 with a margin of 10,674 votes, while in 2014 Lok Sabha poll, LDF candidate A. Sampath secured a lead of 4,163 votes over his UDF rival.
The vote percentage in 2011 was: UDF - 48.78, LDF - 39.61 and BJP - 6.61.
