The election to the 403-member Assembly of the state Uttar Pradesh will be held from February 10, the Election Commission of India (ECI) announced on Saturday. It also said that polling will be held in seven phases. 

The term of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly will end at the end of March.

Also read: Lessons forgotten: Election rallies in India help in surge of COVID-19

The counting of votes will be held on 10 March, 2022.

Addressing the press conference, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sushil Chandra said, “As COVID cases soared in view of Omicron variant, ECI held meetings with Union Health Secretary & Home Secretary, experts, & health secretaries of States. After taking these views & ground situation, ECI decided to announce polls with safety norms in place.”

“A total of 18.34 crore electors including service voters will take part in this election out of which 8.55 crore are women electors,” CEC Sushil Chandra said.

Also Read | Uttar Pradesh elections 2022: Full list of voting dates for all constituencies

Here is the full schedule of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections 2022:

Phase 1

Issue of notification: January 14
Last date of nomination: January 21
Scrutiny of nominations: January 24
Last date of withdrawal of candidature: January 27
Date of Poll: February 10
Date of counting: March 10

Also read: Protestors in Punjab block Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s convoy in major security lapse

Phase 2

Issue of notification: January 21
Last date of nomination: January 28
Scrutiny of nomination: January 29
Last date of withdrawal of candidature: January 31
Date of poll: February 14
Date of counting: March 10

Phase 3

Issue of notification: January 25
Last date of nomination: February 1
Scrutiny of nomination: February 2
Last date of withdrawal of candidature: February 4
Date of poll: February 20
Date of counting: March 10

Phase 4: 

Issue of notification: January 27
Last date of nomination: February 3
Scrutiny of nomination: February 4
Last date of withdrawal of candidature: February 7
Date of poll: February 23
Date of counting: March 10

Phase 5

Issue of notification: February 1
Last date of nomination: February 8
Scrutiny of nomination: February 9
Last date of withdrawal of candidature: February 11
Date of poll: February 27
Date of counting: March 10

Phase 6

Issue of notification: February 4
Last date of nomination: February 11
Scrutiny of nomination: February 14
Last date of withdrawal of candidature: February 16
Date of poll: March 3
Date of counting: March 10

Phase 7

Issue of notification: February 10
Last date of nomination: February 17
Scrutiny of nomination: February 18
Last date of withdrawal of candidature: February 21
Date of poll: March 7
Date of counting: March 10

In 2017, the election to the 17th Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly was held from 11 February to 8 March in 7 phases. In this election, a voter turnout of 61.04% was seen compared to 59.40% in the previous election.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won the election by an overwhelming three-quarters majority of 325 seats despite not projecting a chief ministerial candidate before the election. As part of its election strategy, BJP contested under a collective leadership and capitalised mostly on the political clout and ‘brand’ of its leader Narendra Modi.

Also read: Aam Aadmi Party releases list of three candidates for Punjab Elections 2022

On 18 March 2017, Yogi Adityanath was appointed as the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh. Then Uttar Pradesh BJP chief Keshav Prasad Maurya and Dinesh Sharma were appointed as Deputy Chief Ministers.

On January 6, the EC reviewed the COVID situation with the Union health secretary and health experts, collecting inputs on necessary safety measures to be ensured during the democratic exercise and emphasising the need for vaccination of all eligible people in five poll-bound states.