51% polling recorded in Ghosi

Varanasi: Ghosi witnessed peaceful polling in the assembly byelection on Monday with a brisk 51% voter turnout, according to Election Commission.

Earlier, district election officer Gyan Prakash Tripathi said as per initial calculation, 51% polling was reported in Ghosi assembly area when the polling concluded at 6 pm.

“The final tally is being prepared with the return of polling teams. After final calculation, the polling percentage is likely to remain between 51% and 52%,” said Tripathi, claiming that polling in Ghosi remained “completely peaceful as no untoward incident was reported from any polling station”.

For 4,23,952 voters of Ghosi assembly area, 454 polling booths at 253 polling centres had been established. A very low turnout of voters was witnessed in the early hours of polling as between 7 am and 9 am only 9.05% voters exercised their franchise. During the same time, problems in electronic voting machines were reported from a few, including polling booths of Daddanpur and Amila.

Tripathi said such problems were tackled in few minutes to avoid any interruption in polling.

Improvement in voter turnout became evident after 12 noon and the trend continued till 5 pm.

After exercising his franchise at the polling booth in Daddanpur, SP-supported candidate Sudhakar Singh admitted that polling had taken place peacefully. He claimed that if any unfair practice will not take place, he would win this byelection.

A total of 11 candidates, including BJP’s Vijay Rajbhar, SP-supported independent candidate Sudhakar Singh and BSP’s Qayyum Ansari are in the fray.

Tripathi along with SP Mau Anurag Arya was seen taking stock of poll process and arrangements in Kopaganj, Badagaon, Ghosi township, Lalitpur, Ludahi, Mungesar and other areas. He said that no untoward incident took place anywhere in the assembly area. He said that apart from police and PAC, jawans of Rapid Action Force were also deployed at the polling stations.

Bypoll was necessitated after BJP appointed its sitting MLA Phagu Chauhan as governor of Bihar. In 2017 UP assembly poll, Chauhan had defeated BSP’s Abbas Ansari in a close contest by a margin of 7,003 votes while SP’s Sudhakar Singh had stood at third place with over 59,000 votes.