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Gujarat polls by and large peaceful: EC

By J. Venkatesan

The Deputy Prime Minister, L.K. Advani, about to cast his vote in Ahmedabad on Thursday. — PTI

NEW DELHI Dec. 12. The Election Commission today said that an estimated 63 per cent of the electorate exercised their franchise in the Gujarat Assembly polls, which was by and large peaceful with some minor incidents.

Briefing presspersons, the Deputy Election Commissioner, A.N. Jha, said the voting percentage of 63 per cent was the tentative figure based on preliminary estimates.

Mr. Jha said there was one instance of booth-capturing near Ahmedabad. In two of the polling stations in Anand district, the electronic voting machines (EVMs) were damaged and voting had to be stopped. In another polling station, where an EVM was damaged, it was quickly replaced.

At a booth in Rajkot district, due to the carelessness of the polling officer, 141 votes cast were not recorded. In another booth, where the officials supported the candidate of a political party, polling had to be stopped.

He said a decision regarding re-poll in these booths would be taken after receipt of reports from the returning officers concerned.

Asked about complaints of large-scale deletion of the names of voters, including that of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader, Praveen Togadia, from the electoral rolls, Mr. Jha said, despite the elaborate arrangements made to update the electoral list and adequate opportunities given to political parties, if some names were not in the voters list "at the best we can say it was unfortunate".

Asked about Mr. Togadia's charge accusing the Chief Election Commissioner of deliberately omitting names of a large number of Hindus, Mr. Jha said, "I do not want to react".

Except for some individual complaints, no formal complaints had been made by any political party about deletion of names.

The complaints would be looked into, he said. He recalled the elaborate exercise of revision of the rolls.

House-to-house enumeration was done during September-October last year and a draft roll was published in February. Enough opportunity was given to voters for inclusion of names and final rolls were published in May. Further, the draft rolls were given free to all the political parties to point out discrepancies if any and for inclusion of names.

Byelections

He said 62 per cent polling was recorded in the byelection to the Mehsana Lok Sabha constituency in Gujarat, 59 per cent at Godda in Jharkhand, and 33 per cent at Nainital in Uttaranchal. In the by-elections to five Assembly constituencies, Daporiji (Arunachal Pradesh) recorded 70 per cent; Khumtai (Assam) 60 per cent and Bansur, Sagwara and Bali (Rajasthan), 62, 67 and 62 per cent respectively.

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