After a slow start, polling in Mumbai's six Lok Sabha seats gathered momentum with voter turnout at 51.11 percent voting recorded in Mumbai till 5 pm on Monday. Voting is currently underway in all Lok Sabha seats along with 11 other constituencies mostly located in Western Maharashtra.

Mumbai North, where Bollywood actress and Congress candidate Urmila Matondkar is pitted against BJP's incumbent MP Gopal Shetty, recorded 54.72 percent percent polling till 5 pm.

Mumbai North-West saw 50.44 percent voting where the main battle is between former Congress Mumbai chief Sanjay Nirupam and Shiv Sena's Gajanan Kiritkar.

Mumbai North East registered 52.30 percent polling where BJP's Manoj Kotak takes on Nationalist Congress Party's (NCP) Sanjay Dina Patil.

Mumbai North Central seat recorded 49.49 percent voting till 5 pm. The main contest is between incumbent BJP MP Poonam Mahajan, daughter of late union minister Pramod Mahajan, and Congress candidate Priya Dutt.

Mahajan had defeated Dutt, the daughter of late actor-turned-politician Sunil Dutt and sister of actor Sanjay Dutt, by a margin of 1.86 lakh in the 2014 elections.

Mumbai South Central saw 51.53 percent polling where Shiv Sena's Rahul Shewale is fighting challenge from the Congress's Eknath Gaikwad.

The lowest voter turnout was in Mumbai South at 48.23 percent where former union minister Milind M Deora is contesting against Shiv Sena's Arvind G Sawant.

BJP MP Poonam Mahajan, industrialist Anil Ambani, Congress nominee Urmila Matondkar and actress Rekha were among the early voters in Mumbai.

State education minister Vinod Tawde, BJP candidate from Mumhai-North East Manoj Kotak and Congress nominee from Mumbai-Central Eknath Gaikwad also exercised their franchise in the initial hours.

Bollywood actors Kareena Kapoor, Vidya Balan, Madhuri Dixit Nene, Ajay Devgan, Kajol, Tiger Shroff, Anupam Kher, Paresh Rawal, Ravi Kishan and director Shubhash Ghai were also seen voting in their respective constituencies.

All major markets, including BSE, NSE, forex and money markets are closed on Monday due to elections in Mumbai.

Apart from the six Mumbai Lok Sabha seats, the last phase of polling in Maharashtra also includes Nandurbar (64.44 percent till 5 pm), Dhule (50.97

percent), Dindori (58.20 percent), Nashik (53.09 percent), Palghar (57.60 percent), Bhiwandi (48.90 percent), Kalyan (33.77 percent), Thane (38.52 percent), Maval (52.74 percent), Shirur (52.45 percent) and Shirdi (56.19 percent) seats.

As many as 40 polling booths in these constituencies, including 26 in suburban Mumbai, are being managed by women.

Around 3.11 crore voters spread across the Mumbai metropolitan region and northern and western Maharashtra are eligible to exercise their franchise to decide the fate of 323 candidates in the fray in these 17 seats.

For more, follow our Lok Sabha Elections 2019 Live blog

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First Published:Apr 29, 2019 12:57 PM IST