SHIMLA: The Election Commission on Sunday said that around 75.6 per cent polling percentage was recorded in the recently held Assembly elections in Himachal Pradesh.
“As per the reports received at the state headquarters, the approximate poll percentage in the state stands at 75.6 per cent”, said Chief Electoral Officer Maneesh Garg.
He said that the poll percentage through Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) was 74.6 per cent. Besides this, 1 per cent of postal ballots had been received already, taking the overall turnout to 75.6 per cent till now, and nearly 2 per cent of postal ballots are yet to be received.
The highest polling percentage of 85.25 per cent was reported from Doon Assembly constituency and the lowest polling percentage of 62.53 per cent was in Shimla at the end of the poll.
According to the Election Commission, the total number of males among the electorate was 27,88,925, female voters were 27,36,306 and third gender voters were 38. Of these, the total percentage of the male population who exercised their right to franchise was 72.4 and that of females was 76.8 per cent while the third gender poll percentage was 68.4 per cent.
Garg said that the strong rooms have been sealed with a three-tier security system and scrutiny has been completed, in the presence of Observers of ECI, candidates or their representatives and Returning Officers.
The CEO said due to effective enforcement by all enforcement agencies, especially Income tax, State Excise and police departments, as well as expenditure monitoring teams, seizures of nearly Rs 60 crore were seized since the announcement of the poll on October 14 till the day of polling, as compared to about Rs 10 crore in 2017 Vidhan Sabha elections.
As many as 240 flying squads were deputed in all 68 Assembly segments, besides 242 static surveillance teams, 75 assistant expenditure observers, 166 video surveillance teams, 72 video viewing teams, 73 accounting teams, 53 complaint monitoring control rooms and call centres at Returning Officer (RO) and District Election Officer (DEO) and CEO level, 13 Media Certification and Monitoring Committee (MCMC) and paid news at CEO and DEO level and 13 expenditure monitoring cells at CEO, DEO level round the clock. A total of nearly 3,600 personnel were deployed in the above expenditure monitoring teams.
The CEO revealed that out of the total 1,779 complaints received during this period, 292 were closed after inquiry, and corrective action was taken and compliance reported in as many as 1,308 such complaints. Out of these, 1,013 complaints were received over the C-vigil app out of which corrective action was taken in respect of 861 complaints.
Meanwhile, the Election Commission on Sunday prohibited the conduct of any exit poll and publishing the result of exit polls from November 12 to December 5, 2022. The commission notified the period from 8 am on November 12 to 5.30 pm on December 5 as the period during which conducting any exit poll and publishing results will be prohibited.
The polling was held for 68 constituency seats in Himachal Pradesh on Saturday, and the counting of votes is scheduled to be taken up on December 8. (ANI)