Shillong/TURA: There are over 76,000 young voters in Meghalaya. An election official said that with the new initiatives to woo young voters there is significant improvement in the percentage compared to the past elections.
A huge chunk of new voters will play a crucial role in deciding the fate of the three aspirants, Agatha Sangma of the NPP, Mukul Sangma of the Congress and Rikman Momin of the BJP, in Thursday’s crucial election for the coveted Tura Lok Sabha seat.
West Garo Hills with the largest segment of constituencies and polling stations also has the highest number of new voters.
As many as 17,705 new voters are getting the opportunity to exercise their franchise for the first time in the general election. The district with eleven assembly constituencies has as many as 481 polling stations with the most distant polling centre being at Uringgre village of Raksamgre assembly seat, a distance of 155 kms from district headquarters Tura.
The highest number of voters in a single polling station under the district falls in South Tura constituency under Lower Babupara polling station of the town where the total strength is 1262 voters.
Also in the same constituency lies the smallest number of voters, 162, in Leper colony booth.
Sensitive polling areas due to wild elephant infestation are primarily along the Dalu-Purakhasia-Salmanpara border belt with neighbouring Bangladesh as herds of these wild pachyderms use their traditional routes to migrate.
