Rajnath, Smriti may campaign in CM bastion

SHIMLA: The Election Commission has made special preparations for independent India's first voter Shyam Saran Negi to vote in the upcoming assembly elections in Himachal Pradesh on November 9.As Negi finds it difficult to walk at the age of 100, Kinnaur district administration will provide a special vehicle to take him to the polling station and drop him back home. At the polling station, Negi would receive a grand welcome.Post-independence, when parliamentary polls were being held in the country for the first time, the EC had advanced the voting in Kinnaur, keeping in mind harsh winters and early snowfall. The elections were held in other parts of the country in January and February, 1952.On October 25, 1951, Negi became the first Indian to cast his vote in independent India for Mandi-Mahasu par liamentary constituency (now Mandi). The EC had then carried the election material to Chini (now Kalpa) village polling station, located in a primary school, on mules. He was a government school teacher at the time and retired in 1975.“He is an inspiration to others as he has never missed the chance to vote“ said Surma Devi his daughter-in-law. Negi's name became populr after Google created a video of him for its #PledgeToVote campaign during the 2014 parliamentary polls, where he is shown narrating the story of the first vote.Top BJP leaders including home minister Rajnath Singh, textile minister Smriti Irani and UP CM Yogi Aditya Nath are likely to campaign against chief minister Virbhadra Singh in Arki in the upcoming assembly polls. Though Virbhadra had contested and won the 2012 assembly elections from Shimla rural seat, he has left that seat this time for his son and state Congress chief Vikramditya and shifted to a new constituency-Arki, in Solan district. Arki was a Congress stronghold once but returned the BJP candidates to the assembly in last two elections.