Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday cast his vote at a polling booth in Ahmedabad's Nishan Higher Secondary School. Union Home Minister Amit Shah was also present with the Prime Minister. Modi and Shah also greeted people as they arrived at the polling booth in Ahmedabad.
After casting his vote, Prime Minister Modi urged the countrymen to step out and exercise their right to franchise in large numbers as four phases are still remaining.
"Today is the third phase of voting. There is great importance of 'Daan' in our country and in the same spirit, the countrymen should vote as much as possible. 4 rounds of voting are still ahead. As a voter in Gujarat, this is the only place where I vote regularly and Amit Bhai is contesting from here as a BJP candidate," Modi said.
In this phase, Amit Shah is in the electoral fray from Gujarat's Gandhinagar Lok Sabha constituency. Shah is eyeing his second tenure as Lok Sabha MP in the contest with Congress' Sonal Patel. The voting for all seats in Gujarat, except Surat, will take place today.
Besides Amit Shah, other candidates to watch for in the Gujarat Lok Sabha contest are Union ministers Mansukh Mandaviya and Parshottam Rupala. While Mandaviya is contesting his first-ever Lok Sabha election from Porbandar, Rupala is in the fray from Rajkot.
The Lok Sabha seats in Gujarat where voting will take place today are Kachchh, Banaskantha, Patan, Mahesana, Sabarkantha, Gandhinagar, Ahmedabad East, Ahmedabad West, Surendranagar, Rajkot, Porbandar, Janmagar, Junagadh, Amreli, Bhavnagar, Anand, Kheda, Panchmahal, Dahod, Vadodara, Chhota Udaipur, Bardoli, Bharuch, Navsari, and Valsad.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won on all 26 seats in the state whereas the Congress could not win any seat in the border state. The overall voter turnout in this election was 64.51 per cent. Notable wins in this election included Amit Shah from Gandhinagar, Darshana Jardosh from Surat, BJP Gujarat chief CR Paatil from Navsari and Devusinh Chauhan from Kheda.