Enthusiastic voters defeat poll delay due to EVM snag
JAIPUR: RAJASTHAN SAW
73.82% VOTER TURNOUT IN THE ELECTION TO THE 199 ASSEMBLY CONSTITUENCIES
The state election department’s control rooms Friday became active as voting began at 8am but faced technical glitches for most part of the day.
Polling percentage on the department’s website — www.ceorajasthan.nic.in — was not regularly updated, and at one point, around 11.30am, reported 100% turnout in a few constituencies but the data was soon pulled down.
As per the data available until going to print, Rajasthan saw 73.82% voter turnout in the election to the 199 assembly constituencies. The results will be declared on December 11.
The election department had set up two control rooms – one where the staff attended to complaints from people regarding their names missing from the voter list and voting not starting at 8am; in the other room, the officials kept a watch over the developments at sensitive polling booths through live webcasting.
Officials said the three landline phones in one of the control rooms kept ringing off the hook, with complaints about voting not starting as per the schedule, names missing from the voter list, and malfunctioning of the electronic voter machines (EVMs).
Officials said the complaints were duly communicated to the returning officers at the booths concerned informed about the problem and taking updates of problems being resolved.
Deputy chief electoral officer Vinod Pareek said at the start of the voting, “there was some problems with the EVMs and there was a delay in voting”. He said the problems were faced at Jodhpur, Jaipur, Churu, Ganganagar, Kota and Jodhpur districts but all the issues “had been taken care of”.
The average delay in voting was by 20 minutes, the official said. In regard to replacement of ballot units, control units and voter verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT), there were some complaints — 0.2% in ballot units, 0.2% in control units, and about 1% in VVPAT machines.
There are 51,687 polling stations in the 199 assembly constituencies where voting took place. Polling in Ramgarh constituency in Alwar district has postponed to an unspecified date due to the death of Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) candidate Laxman Singh on November 29.
At the control room, critical polling booths were monitored through webcasting.
Joint chief electoral officer MM Tiwari said these booths were being monitored by the returning officer, district administration officers, and the Election Commission of India. In the last assembly elections, webcasting was done at 1,300 critical polling stations, while this year, 3,078 booths were identified as sensitive.