The second phase of voting in the Lok Sabha elections 2024 will see some of the most closely-watched contests. The focus will be on Kerala, a Left bastion where the stakes are high for both BJP and Congress. As many as 1,202 candidates are contesting from 88 constituencies in this phase on April 26 (Friday). The overall results for all 543 seats will be declared together on June 4.

Here are the top 10 candidates in Phase 2:

Hema Malini (BJP), Mathura

Actor-turned-politician Hema Malini has spent two decades in politics, serving as an MP in both Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha. She has been representing the Mathura constituency in Lok Sabha since 2014. She describes herself as a devotee of Lord Krishna who wants to serve the people of Mathura, known as the birthplace of the deity.

Rajeev Chandrashekhar (BJP), Thiruvananthapuram

Rajeev Chandrashekhar takes on the Congress’s Shashi Tharoor in his electoral debut from Thiruvananthapuram. He is an MP from Rajya Sabha and a junior minister of State for Information Technology and Skill Development. His profiles on government websites also describe him as an entrepreneur and a technocrat.

Shashi Tharoor (Congress), Thiruvananthapuram

A three-time MP from Thiruvananthapuram, Shashi Tharoor is a former diplomat known for his impeccable vocabulary and debating skills. He had lost the Congress presidential elections to Mallikarjun Kharge. This election, he takes on Union Minister Rajeev Chandrashekhar in his stronghold.

Rahul Gandhi (Congress), Wayanad

The most prominent face of the opposition side, Rahul Gandhi is the only Gandhi family member to contest elections this time. He will try to defend his Wayanad seat against Kerala BJP chief K Surendra and the CPM’s Annie Raja. It is not known if he will try to win back his Amethi seat too, which goes to polls in Phase 5 (May 20).

Vaibhav Gehlot (Congress), Jalore

Son of Congress veteran Ashok Gehlot, Vaibhav Gehlot will try his luck from Jalore in Rajasthan this time, adjacent to Jodhpur where he had lost to Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat in 2019 by over 2.5 lakh votes. Last year, he was summoned in a foreign exchange violation case, prompting his father to attack the centre for alleging misusing central agencies.

Arun Govil (BJP), Meerut

Arun Govil commands huge popularity among the masses, being the actor who sketched the role of Lord Ram in the 1987 adaptation of ‘Ramayana’ by Ramanand Sagar. The BJP has fielded him from his hometown Meerut for a triangular contest against his SP and BSP rivals.

Tejasvi Surya (BJP), Bangalore South

The BJP has repeated Tejasvi Surya from Bangalore South, the seat that he won in his maiden election to become the party’s youngest face in the Lok Sabha. A firebrand leader, Mr Surya is known for his spirited debates, though he isn’t unknown to controversies either. In 2022, he had courted controversy after he “mistakenly” opened the emergency exit of an IndiGo plane, and had apologized.

Bhupesh Baghel (Congress), Rajnandgaon

Bhupesh Baghel, a former chief minister, will try his luck with the national elections this time, having lost power in the Chhattisgarh assembly in last year’s state elections. He faces a police case in the alleged Mahadev online betting scam, which he has denounced as a “political conspiracy”.

KC Venugopal (Congress), Alappuzha

KC Venugopal, a close aide of Rahul Gandhi, has served as a minister in the Manmohan Singh cabinet. A two-time MP from Alappuzha in Kerala (2009-19), he did not contest the 2019 elections and became a Rajya Sabha member a year later. This time, he is pitted against AM Ariff (CPM) and Sobha Surendran (BJP).

Ravindra Singh Bhati (Independent), Barmer

Ravindra Singh Bhati is just 26, but has already achieved a spectacular feat in Rajasthan’s political landscape. He polled 80,000 votes in the 2023 assembly elections in Sheopur to become an Independent MLA. He’s contesting the Lok Sabha polls from Barmer, taking on sitting BJP MP Kailash Choudhary and the Congress’s Ummeda Ram Beniwal.

The second phase of the Lok Sabha elections 2024 will see crores of people cast votes in 88 seats across India.

Many key and high-profile seats where voting will be held in the second phase include Wayanad, Bangalore South, Mathura, Mysore, and Thiruvananthapuram, to name a few.

How did some of these key seats vote in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections?

In Bangalore Central, the BJP’s PC Mohan won by over six lakh votes to his nearest rival, the Congress’s Rizwan Arshad, who polled 5.3 lakh votes.

In Uttar Pradesh’s Mathura, the BJP’s Hema Malini received 6.71 lakh votes, against her nearest rival Kunwar Narendra Singh of the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), who polled 3.7 lakh votes.

In Kerala’s Thiruvananthapuram, the Congress’s Shashi Tharoor won with 4.16 lakh votes, while BJP’s Kummanam Rajasekharan was the runners-up.

In Karnataka’s Mysore, the BJP’s Pratap Simha won the election after polling 6.9 lakh votes. The Congress’s CH Vijayashankar was the runners-up.

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi won from Kerala’s Wayanad in 2019; he polled 7 lakh votes. His nearest rival PP Suneer from the Communist Part of India came second with 2.7 lakh votes.

In Madhya Pradesh, BJP leader Virendra Kumar Khatik is eyeing a fourth win from Tikamgarh. The Congress has fielded a new face, Pankaj Ahirwar, from the constituency. In 2019, Mr Khatik defeated Congress’s Kiran Ahirwar by a margin of over 3.48 lakh votes.

Staggered over seven stages, the first phase of the elections held last Friday for 102 seats across 21 states and Union Territories saw a voter turnout of around 65.5 per cent.

Polling is scheduled in all 20 seats of Kerala, 14 of the 28 seats in Karnataka, 13 seats in Rajasthan, 8 seats each in Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, 7 seats in Madhya Pradesh, 5 seats each in Assam and Bihar, 3 seats each in Chhattisgarh and West Bengal, and 1 seat each in Manipur, Tripura, and Jammu and Kashmir.

Votes will be counted on June 4.

PM Modi on Thursday accused Congress of including Muslims as a whole in the OBC list in Karnataka “through the backdoor” and promoting reservation on religious lines in violation of the Constitution. He said when the Constitution was drafted, to protect the unity and integrity of the country, it was decided that there won’t be religion-based reservation. He said Congress’s decision to declare all Muslims in Karnataka as “backward”, on a par with OBCs, was inimical to the interests of backward classes.