Polling for Panchayats, Municipalities conclude peacefully in Gujarat

Gandhinagar

Polling for 56 municipalities, 31 district and 230 taluka panchayats concluded peacefully today.

As per the initial estimates an average 55 to 60% polling has been reported. The voting percentage figures for each of the three types of polling ie municipalities, district and taluka panchayats was also more or less the same. Some of the local bodies especially taluka panchayats have reportedly seen as high a turn out as 65 to 70 percent. However, the official figures of the voting percentage are likely to be compiled and issued either late this evening or tomorrow.

The head of the legal cell of the ruling BJP in the state Mr. Parindu Bhagat has filed a complaint with the state election commission regarding the alleged violation of model code of conduct by state congress president Bharatsinh Solanki for allegedly showing his party sign (hand) after casting his vote at a booth in Vedarada village under Borsad taluka of Anand district. The congress on the other hand also filed a similar complaint against BJP MLA from Bhuj Nimaben Acharya for allegedly organizing mass feast for voters. In Anand the mob beat up an independent candidate while congress party alleged that its candidate in Gamdi of Dahod district Panchayat was kidnapped by the local BJP activists.

State Election Commissioner Varesh Sinha said that there were a total of 19724 candidates in the fray. Almost 2.60 crore voters can cast their votes on 33286 booths of which 8110 have been declared sensitive while 4422 hyper sensitive.

Polling in various places including Jetalpur in Ahmedabad, Vibhapar in Jamnagar, Halar and Pariya in Valsad, Bhadkodara in Ankaleshwar of Bharuch, Javna in Savli of Vadodara, Charanda in Patan could not start in time owing to technical snags in the EVMs.

The BJP, which had won majority of the seats in the last elections, had made development the main poll plank while opposition Congress had raked up issues like price rise and reservation of Patel community.

As per the official figures provided by the SEC, 27 candidates for the municipalities have been elected unopposed while 7 and 54 candidates for district and taluka panchayats respectively have won unopposed.

Elaborate security arrangements were made for the peaceful conduct of the polling with a total of 193 companies of various police and paramilitary forces apart from around 60000 other personnel of Gujarat police and home guards deployed across all the segments. It included 47 companies of para military forces, 11 companies of police and border wing home guards from neighbouring Rajasthan, 10 companies of Maharashra police and five companies of Madhya Pradesh Police.Counting will be done on December 2.

Around 48 percent average polling was reported on November 22 in the municipal corporations across six cities Ahmedabad, Surat, Vadodara, Rajkot, Bhavnagar and Jamnagar held on November 22. Counting for both the phase will take place on December 2.

– DeshGujarat