Jammu: Jammu and Kashmir on Saturday witnessed highest voter turnout in over two decades in 20 constituencies of Jammu’s border region in the last leg of Assembly election in the State amid threat of firing from across the border.
“Total 66 per cent of polling has been registered in all the phases of Jammu and Kashmir and last phase in Jammu, Kathua and Rajouri has registered highest 76 per cent polling today,” Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), J-K Umang Narula told reporters here, adding that it is further likely to increase.
This year’s turnout is 5.51 per cent more than 2008 Assembly elections, 22.30 per cent than 2002 polls and 12.08 per cent than State elections of 1996, while 74.88 per cent polling was recorded in 1987.
In the five-phased Assembly elections in the State, the first phase recorded 71.28 per cent followed by 72.10 per cent in second phase, 58 per cent in third phase and 49 per cent in fourth phase.
The CEO said that no untoward incident was reported in the polling today.
Divisional Commissioner Jammu Shantmanu said 400 security companies (40,000 security men) have been deployed for today’s polling apart from regular deployment of police forces. Security arrangements along the border have been strengthened with troops put on alert for the polls. “Security grid along the Indo-Pak border has been put on alert. Multi-tier security has been put in place”, the Divisional Commissioner said. Narula said that in all the five phases, a total of 831 candidates, 803 men and 28 women, tried their luck on all the 87 Assembly seats spread across the state.
“There were a total of 10,035 polling stations at 7,657 locations across the State. A total of 53,272 polling personnel helped conduct the polls,” he said.
He said that 617 polling stations were identified as critical whereas 2,036 polling stations were kept under hyper-sensitive category.
“There was no incident attempts from across the border to disrupt the poll process,” Narula said.
Terming the conduct of elections as “successful”, Narula held coordination between various agencies responsible for the success. He said that an amount in excess of one crore rupees was recovered by various poll parties.
“In all the five phases, an amount of 1,47,00,000 has been seized and investigations are being held in to the same, he said.
The Inspector General of Police, Jammu Range, Rakesh Kumar said that police has registered three criminal complaints in connection with three incidents of election related violence last night. “An FIR has been registered against a sitting minister in Bilawar, another one in Akhnoor and in Nowshera, in poll related violence in which different parties came to blow with each other,” he said. PTI