The devastating earthquake on last Saturday, which had caused widespread damage in neighbouring Nepal, also made its presence felt in Pharenda assembly segment of Maharajganj, which will go for by-poll on Thursday. The earthquake has rattled the voters in this constituency on the Indo-Nepal border and the campaigning in the constituency, which ended on Tuesday evening, was disrupted for almost three days. There are seven candidates in the fray with sitting member and BJP candidate Bajrang Bahadur Singh, Vinod of the Samajwadi Party and Virendra Choudhury of the Congress are the main contenders.

BSP is not contesting the by-poll. The seat was vacant following disqualification of the BJP member after he was found availing government contracts during a probe by the lokayukta. The polling would be held under tight security arrangements and it would be monitored by the Central forces, from 8am hours till 15pm on Thursday. The counting of votes would be taken up on May 3. Altogether 3,43,726 voters including 1,77,872 males and 1,45,835 females are eligible to vote at 312 polling booths.

Meanwhile, the quake had even created panic among the senior leaders of parties who were campaigning for their candidates. Senior Congress leaders Raj Babbar and Pramod Tiwari, who were campaigning for the party candidate Virendra Chaudhary were deceived by the huge rush of people who came out on the streets on April 25 . “Initially, we thought that crowd was attracted by our road show, and felt elated. However, all our excitement virtually fizzled out, when it became clear that people had spilled on the roads because of the earthquake aftershocks,” said Chaudhary. He further added that during the second aftershock, the dais started shaking, and the curtains came down. Similar views were also expressed by Vinod, the Samajwadi Party candidate, who after experiencing the aftershocks halted the poll campaign and started enquiring about the well being of the public.

“A large number of people here have their relatives living in Nepal. We were in constant touch with the public, and arranging relief material,” Vinod said. Poll officials who were undergoing EVM training at different places in the assembly constituency felt the aftershocks. “We were being briefed about the working of an electronic voting machine, when we felt the aftershocks. It persisted for few seconds, and after which all of us realised that we were in the middle of an earthquake aftershock,” said a senior official posted on by-election duty in Pharenda. Independent candidates - Vijay Singh and Kishan called off their election meeting, after news of aftershocks started to trickle in. The lone woman candidate in the poll fray - Shivkumari also admitted that the campaigning gained momentum only on April 27, as for two days, campaigning was severely affected.