Forty-one candidates were left in fray for the three Lok Sabha seats and 178 for the 15 Assembly seats in the district after the withdrawal of nominations on Wednesday for the May 7 general elections.
Visakhapatnam Lok Sabha constituency has 22 candidates, Anakapalle eight and Araku (ST) 11. Six candidates -- four for Visakhapatnam seat and one each for Anakapalle and Araku -- have withdrawn their nominations leaving 41 in the fray.
Out of the 232 valid nominations for the Assembly constituencies, 54 have withdrawn.
Visakhapatnam East tops the Assembly segments with 21 contestants. Interestingly none has withdrawn from this segment. Madugula has the lowest number of seven contestants.
The following are the number of contestants for each Assembly segment (with number of withdrawals in brackets): Bheemunipatnam 8 (4); Visakha East 21 (0); Visakha South 15 (3); Visakha North 13 (6); Visakha West 12 (2); Gajuwaka 17 (3); Chodavaram 8 (3); Madugula 7 (2); Araku Valley 11 (6); Paderu 10 (4); Anakapalle 14 (3); Pendurthi 10 (1); Elamanchili 11 (5); Payakaraopeta 10 (16) and Narsipatnam 11 (6).
With the number contestants crossing 15 for Visakhapatnam Lok Sabha and Visakha East and Gajuwaka Assembly constituencies, two EVMs have to be set up in each polling booth of these constituencies, since an EVM can have names of 15 contestants and one slot for NOTA option.
