New Delhi [India], May 6 : The high-profile Guna Lok Sabha constituency in Madhya Pradesh will vote in the third phase on Tuesday.
The parliamentary constituency consists of eight Assembly seats spread across three districts -- Guna, Ashok Nagar, and Shivpuri. Its eight Vidhan Sabha constituencies are Shivpuri, Pichhore, Kolaras, Bamori, Guna, Ashok Nagar, Chanderi, and Mungaoli.
In this election, Jyotiraditya Scindia is contesting his first Lok Sabha polls with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and hopes to reclaim his family's lost bastion of Guna after more than four years since he made the switch from the Congress.
Guna is historically a stronghold of the Scindia family, as Vijaya Raje Scindia, Madhavrao Scindia, and Jyotiraditya Scindia have all seen electoral success here. BJP which won the Guna Lok Sabha seat in 2019, decided to drop its sitting MP and fielded Jyotiraditya Scindia as their Lok Sabha candidate, who previously won four times from this seat on Congress's ticket. Notably, Scindia lost the Guna Lok Sabha seat in 2019 against BJP's Krishna Pal Singh Yadav as a Congress candidate.
Scindia joined the party in March 2020 as he led a rebel group of Congress 22 MLAs to bring down the Kamal Nath-led MP government.
The Scindia family borough has retained the Guna seat on 14 occasions out of 18 elections held for this LS seat, regardless of party affiliations.
This time, for Scindia, his wife Priyadarshini Raje Scindia and son Mahanaryaman are also on the campaign trail.
On the other hand, Congress has fielded Rao Yadavendra Singh Yadav, who joined Congress after leaving BJP in 2023. This will be Yadvendra Singh's first attempt at the mainstream politics.
Yadav, whose father was a BJP MLA, had moved to the Opposition party just ahead of the 2023 Assembly election. Yadav's father, Rao Deshraj Singh Yadav, has also unsuccessfully contested the Lok Sabha polls from Guna, once losing to Madhavrao Scindia in 1999 and then again losing to the younger Scindia in 2002.
Madhya Pradesh is set to go to the polls for nine parliamentary seats in the third phase of the Lok Sabha election from 7 am onwards tomorrow and a total of 127 candidates, including nine women candidates are in the fray in this phase, an official said.
Nine parliamentary seats in the state - Morena, Bhind, Gwalior, Guna, Sagar, Vidisha, Bhopal, Rajgarh and Betul- will go to the polls in the third phase of LS polls on May 7 from 7 am to 6 pm. A total of 72 assembly constituencies and 19 districts are included in these nine Lok Sabha seats which will undergo polling.
Lok Sabha polls in Madhya Pradesh are being conducted in four phases. The first phase of polling was held on April 19 and the second phase was concluded on April 26.
The third phase of polling is scheduled for tomorrow May 7 and the fourth which is the last phase of LS polls in the state will be held on May 13. The counting of votes will be held on June 4.
With 29 Lok Sabha constituencies, Madhya Pradesh ranks sixth among all states in terms of its representation in the Lower House. Of these, 10 seats are reserved for SC and ST candidates, while the remaining 19 are unreserved.