Bhubaneswar, March 24: Elections to three Municipal Corporations, 47 Municipalities and 59 NACs in Odisha began peacefully at 8 AM this morning. State Election Commission Secretary R N Sahu said polling is going on smoothly and there are no reports of any problem reported from anywhere in the state.
Sahu said there has been no disruption of polling due to malfunctioning of the EVM from anywhere in the state. He said till 12 PM three Municipal Corporations had recorded around 21 per cent polling while the Municipalities and NACs had recorded 32 per cent polling. Over 40.55 voters are scheduled to exercise their franchise in the civic bodies election across the state. Voting will continue till 5 PM and the counting of votes will be taken up on March 26. SEC sources said about 22,000 polling officials are deployed for the smooth conduct of the election.
As many as 569 candidates are contesting for Mayor, Chairpersons posts while 5842 candidates are in the fray for the post of Cooperators and Councillors. For the first time, the Mayors and Municipalities Chairpersons posts are being elected directly by the people. Elections are being held in 1672 wards in Municipalities and NACs and 165 wards in three Municipal corporations- Bhubaneswar, Cuttack and Berhampur. Necessary arrangements have been made for the voters to exercise their franchise in 2989 booths of Municipality/NAC and in 1384 booths in three Municipal corporations. Candidates in three wards in Berhampur Municipal Corporation and 58 wards in other Municipalities and NACs in the state have been declared unopposed.
Since no candidates have filed their nominations in one ward each in Pattamundai Municipality, Kamakhyanagar and Purusottampur NAC the state government will nominate candidates to these posts as per the law since these posts are reserved category. State Police have deployed 195 platoons of police forces for the smooth conduct of the election. As many as 300 mobile parties were deployed on the duty of which 109 have been deployed in three Municipal Corporations. The arrangement has been made for videography of the election process in all the sensitive booths. The latest reports said a youth was stabbed in front of Booth No 16 in ward no 9 of Dhamnagar NAC in Bhadrak district. The youth was admitted to Bhadrak district headquarters hospital. UNI
