By IANS,
Agartala : Two 26-year-olds are the youngest contenders in the Feb 14 Tripura assembly polls, while an 85-year-old veteran CPI-M leader is the oldest among the 249 candidates vying for a place in the 60-member house, an official said Sunday.
“Satiram Reang of the IPFT (Indigenous Peoples Front of Tripura) and Charandra Reang, an independent candidate, both aged 26, are contesting from Karbook assembly segment, reserved for Scheduled Tribes (ST) candidates,” Tripura Chief Electoral Officer Ashutosh Jindal told reporters here.
Octogenarian Nirajoy Tripura, a Communist Party of India-Marxist legislator, is seeking re-election from the Chawmanu assembly seat, also reserved for ST candidates.
Of the 249 candidates in the fray, 14 are women. In the 2008 assembly polls, 313 candidates, including 31 women, had contested.
“In the next week’s election, 2,355,446 electors, including 1,156,476 women and 53,580 first-time voters, are eligible to exercise their franchise,” Jindal said.
To conduct the elections, 3,041 polling stations will be set up across Tripura, which is 650 more than during the 2008 elections, he said.