NEW DELHI: Breaking all records, Delhi registered the highest-ever voter turnout of 65.13 per cent in the keenly contested Assembly polls with men and women coming out in almost equal numbers to exercise their franchise, Delhi’s Election Commission said today.
In 2008 Assembly polls, the overall voting percentage was 57.58 while in 1993, it was 61.75 per cent. Out of 1.19 crore eligible voters, over 77.7 lakh people exercised their franchise yesterday. The number of first-time eligible voters is 4.05 lakh.
Creating history, 65.48 per cent men and 64.68 women cast their ballot in the three-cornered contest among Congress, BJP and debutant Aam Aadmi Party.
The highest turnout was recorded in the Seemapuri seat (72.19 per cent), while the lowest polling was in Ballimaran with 56.20 per cent.
Among the nine districts, the highest turnout of over 68 per cent was recorded in North-East.
In an unprecedented exercise, voting went on till 9.30 PM –four-and-a-half hours past the 5 PM voting deadline–when the last ballot was cast by waiting voters in a booth in Okhla Assembly segment.
The stunning voter turnout that shattered the previous highest of 61.75 per cent in the first elections to the state Assembly in 1993 saw voting hours being extended in several polling booths beyond the closing time of 5 PM as around 1.7 lakh voters were still waiting in winding queues.
Elaborate security arrangements were made in the capital with deployment of 32,801 personnel of the Delhi Police and 11,000 home guards, besides 10,700 central paramilitary force personnel to conduct peaceful election.
A total of 810 candidates are in the fray. Counting of votes is scheduled to take place on December 8.
While BJP has fielded candidates in 66 constituencies, Congress and AAP are contesting in all the 70 seats. BSP, which was the third largest party in last Assembly election, has fielded candidates in 69 seats, NCP in nine and Samajwadi Party in 27 seats. A total of 224 independents are also in the fray.
Election Commission-appointed teams had also made a record seizure of Rs 1.64 crore cash and 41,000 liquor bottles and registered 21 cases of paid news.
According to the data compiled by the Election Expenditure Monitoring Centre of the Income Tax department, other inducements (sarees, gifts) worth Rs 4.40 lakh were seized by the EC-appointed flying squads and surveillance teams.
In all, 210 flying squad teams, 210 static surveillance teams and 18 expenditure observers were deployed in the state by the EC as part of its measures to curb and check illegal money power being used in the run-up to the polls.
77 cases were registered by I-T department and other tax authorities for violation of expenditure norms set by the EC.
596 excise raids were conducted during the polls, the data said.
“It was an incident-free election, although a few cases of minor scuffle were reported from some areas. Model Code of Conduct was strictly implemented to provide a level playing field to all political parties,” Delhi’s Chief Electoral Officer Vijay Dev said.–PTI
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