Tripura: 84 per cent of the 1.2 million electorate on Monday cast their ballot as polling was held in one of the two Lok Sabha constituencies in the Left-ruled Tripura, an official said.
No untoward incident was reported as balloting took place in West Tripura constituency, police and election officials said. "Polling was absolutely peaceful," an officer added.
"Around 84 per cent of 12.46 lakh voters cast their votes when the last reports were received here at 5 pm. The polling percentage may increase after the final reports come here from all four districts," Tripura Chief Electoral Officer Ashutosh Jindal told IANS.
In the last Lok Sabha polls in 2009, the voter turnout was 84.45 per cent and in 2004 it was 67.39 per cent across Tripura.
Jindal said people were still waiting in queues at many polling stations though the 10-hour-long balloting officially ended at 5 pm.
He said no major complaint of wrongdoing was received from any political parties. "Dressed in colourful attires, people were seen standing in long queues at most of the 1,605 polling stations as soon as voting began at 7 am. Clear sky with excellent weather encouraged voters to come to the polling booths early," Jindal added.
"First-time voters and women were enthusiastic after casting their vote," the official said, quoting reports from the districts.
"In some booths, due to technical snags in electronic voting machines (EVMs), voting was delayed for a while, but engineers either replaced or rectified the EVMs at once and balloting started as usual," he said.
Polling in the tribal reserved Tripura East constituency will be held April 12.
In 2009, CPI-M's Khagen Das defeated Sudip Roy Barman of the Congress.
This time, CPI-M's trade union leader Sankar Prasad Datta, Congress's Arunoday Saha, BJP state president Sudhindra Chandra Dasgupta, Trinamool Congress's state chief Ratan Chakraborty, Tripura Pragatishil Gramin Congress president Subal Bhowmik, and Aam Aadmi Party's Salil Saha are among the aspirants.
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