Chennai/Thiruvanathapuram: The process for May 16 Assembly elections in Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Puducherry on Friday began with the issuing of notifications by the Election Commission. Filing of nominations will now start for 234 constituencies in Tamil Nadu, 140 constituencies in Kerala and 30 seats in Puducherry.
The last date to submit nomination papers is April 29 and it would be scrutinized the next day. May 2 will be the last day for withdrawal. Counting of votes is on May 19.
Around 5.6 crore people are eligible to cast their franchise in Tamil Nadu where about 65,000 polling booths will be set up. Tamil Nadu is witnessing a multi-cornered contest involving ruling AIADMK, DMK, PWF-DMDK-TMC combine and PMK and the BJP-led alliance.
Among the top leaders who campaigned were AIADMK supremo and Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa, DMK President M Karunanidhi, his son M K Stalin, DMDK founder Vijayakant, MDMK's Vaiko and PMK's Chief Ministerial candidate Anbumani Ramadoss. The Union Territory of Puducherry has a total of 9,48,717 voters and 4,97,790 of them are women. 930 polling booths would be set up.
