Jaipur, Nov 25: More than 73 per cent of the electorate in Rajasthan voted on Saturday in a bipolar contest involving the Congress and the BJP to elect a new government, with polling passing off peacefully barring a few stray incidents of violence. Chief Electoral Officer Praveen Gupta said that the final voting figures will be issued once data is compiled.
In the last assembly elections in 2018, the state recorded a voter turnout of 74.06 per cent. The Election Commission has set a target of at least 75 per cent turnout in each constituency this time.
Voting at more than 51,000 polling booths in 199 assembly constituencies began at 7 am and ended at 6 pm, but officials said those already in queue at the polling booths were allowed to vote.
“Polling percentage till 5 pm is 68.2 per cent. The highest turnout was in Jaisalmer district, followed by Hanumangarh and Dholpur districts,” Gupta said at a press conference after the polling ended.
The election in the desert state is a direct contest between the ruling Congress and the opposition BJP. The Congress is aiming to buck the trend of the ruling party being voted out every five years, while the BJP is eyeing a return in the state ahead of the Lok Sabha polls next year.Nearly 10 per cent of the electorate cast their votes in the first two hours of voting and the figure went up to nearly 25 per cent by 11 am and to more than 40 per cent by 1 pm. Polling in the Karanpur assembly constituency in Sriganganagar was postponed due to the death of the Congress candidate.
The votes will be counted on December 3.
Two people – Shanti Lal, who was a polling agent of the BJP candidate from the Sumerpur constituency Joraram Kumawat, and 62-year-old voter Satyendra Arora – died of cardiac arrest at polling booths in Pali and Udaipur districts.
There are more than 5.25 crore registered voters in 199 seats while 1,862 candidates are in the fray.
The Election Commission had made elaborate arrangements to ensure smooth polling. More than 1.70 lakh security personnel were deployed across the state.
In Sanwler village of Kaman in Deeg district, two persons including a policeman were injured in stone-pelting. “Police fired 12 rounds in the air to disperse the crowd. Voting was disrupted for a few minutes due to the incident,” Deeg Superintendent of Police (SP) Brijesh Upadhyay said. In Sikar’s Fatehpur, two groups clashed and a jawan was injured in the violence.
“Stone pelting occurred outside a polling booth. One jawan was injured in the stone pelting. No civilian was injured. Around 5-7 persons have been detained,” Fatehpur DSP Ram Pratap said. (PTI)
