64.39 voting recorded on 20 seats in second phase polling

 Ranchi: Barring few stray incidents including one in Sisai in which a youth was killed in police firing polling for the second phase of elections on 20 seats of the state concluded by and large peacefully with an average voter turn out of 64.39 percent being recorded so far.

Compared to the elections of 2014 in this phase, the average voter turn out has declined by 4.57 percent. In 2014 the average voter turnout on these 20 seats was 68.01 percent while in 2019 it is at 63.44 percent. Polling on
Jamshedpur East and Jamshedpur West seats came to an end at 1700hrs while at the remaining seats it had ended couple of hours before at 1500hrs since these constituencies fell under Left Wing Extremism Zone.

Out of the 20 seats which went to the polls a maximum of 16 were reserved for Scheduled Tribes, 1 for Schedule Caste and three others including Bahragora, Jamshedpur East and Jamshedpur West were in general category.

Among the constituencies, Bahragora witnessed a maximum turnout at 74.44 percent while Jamshedpur West saw the minimum turnout of 47.42 percent.

Constituency wise voter turnout is as following: Bahragora 74.44 percent, Ghatshila (ST) 70.65 percent, Potka (ST) 66.5 percent, Jugsalai (SC) 66.29 percent, Jamshedpur East 50.67 percent, Jamshedpur West 47.42 percent, Saraikela (ST) 60.05 percent, Chaibasa (ST) 65.09 percent, Majhganon (ST) 66.84 percent, Jagannathpur (ST) 62.57 percent, Manoharpur (ST) 60.03 percent, Chakardharpur (ST) 65.61 percent, Kharasawan (ST) 62.22 percent, Tamar (ST) 68.11 percent, Torpa (ST) 64.24 percent, Khunti (ST) 63.66 percent, Mandar (ST) 67.52 percent, Sisai (ST) 68.6 percent, Simdega (ST) 64.74 percent and Kolebira (ST) 65.48 percent.

Addressing a press conference here State’s Chief Electoral Officer Vinay Kumar Choubey said that the commission was satisfied with the poll percentage however he said that he can not give any specific reason for the  decline as across the board the percentage has taken a dip.

Mr Choubey said that barring Sisai in all the constituencies the voting percentage has gone down which will be analysed going forward. However he said that overall turn out of 63.44 percent figures is still not final and a complete data will be available in a span of next one or two days.

He said that during the day three incidents were recorded including one at booth number 36 in Baghni village of Sisai Assembly area where a clash broke out between jawans of RPF and villagers after some anti social elements tried to snatch the arms of the security personnel, the forces were compelled to open fire in self defence in which a youth Jilani Ansari was killed while two others were injured.

The CEO said that post the incident the polling was called off on the both and the DC cum DEO has been asked to file a report over the incident. He said that the office has written to the Election Commission to order a re-poll on the booth which is most likely to happen on December 9 however an official confirmation is being awaited.

He said that another incident took place in Chaibasa where booth number 84 had been relocated to Pandabir. Post the relocation a bus was sent to bring the voters to the new booth however in the forest area the bus was stopped by the maoists who set in on fire. However, no casualty was reported in the incident. Mr Choubey said that third and last incident of the day took place in Tamar booth number 132 which also has some portions in Arki block of Khunti district.

On the way back the polling party was attacked by the maoists which was strongly retaliated by the security personnel accompanying the polling party and soon more reinforcement was sent from the district after which the area was dominated by the security forces and maoists were forced to flee. The total number 48,250,38 voters were eligible to vote in this phase is 48,250,38 which included 24,31,511 male voters 23,93,437 female voters and 90 third gender voters.