Polling went of peacefully in all the 10 Assembly constituencies in the district. Polling in rural pockets reported brisk voting both in the morning and evenings. The city areas were slow to catch up though. There was a visible complacency among the urban voters especially among the youth. The district this time witnessed a polling of 68.61 per cent as against the 75.29 during the 2011 poll.
Officials said that a cursory look at the polling per cent across the 10 Assembly constituencies revealed that constituencies with more rural areas had scored a higher percentage than those with more urban composition.
In a bid to ensure higher voting percentage, cinema theatres cancelled their noon and matinee shows and resumed operations only from the first show. With shops and hotels downing shutters to enable their staff discharge their democratic duty, those on duty and out of their houses had a tough time in locating a hotel that remained open for their food.
Overcast sky
Overcast sky did help voters in that they went out to vote but drizzle thereafter kept them indoors. In many places voters went to polling booth with umbrellas. Women also carried infants to polling booths. In a polling booth in the Coimbatore North Assembly constituency, voters welcomed the use of the Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) machines that display who the voter has voted for, as a sign of confirmation.
D Sreenivasan of E.B. Colony, Vadavalli, said that the Election Commission should introduce the machines in all Assembly constituencies in the State as it would help boost voters’ trust that they had voted for the person they wanted to.
In rural areas, party men passively canvassed for their candidates by showing party symbols to voters outside the 100 m mark.
In Mettupalayam, skirmishes broke out between AIADMK and DMK on Annaji Rao Road.
The poll officials had to marshal Central Paramilitary Force personnel to disperse the agitated crowd. Other than such incidents in a few other places, polling was peaceful, said senior district administration officials.
Minor technical snags were reported in the EVMs in booth no. 147, 148 and 155 in Rathinapuri area and booth no. 183 at K.K. Pudur in the Coimbatore North Assembly segment shortly after polling commenced. They were rectified and polling resumed in a short time.
While rain played spoil sport, polling was very poor in the city earlier during the day. After five hours of polling only around 15 per cent votes were polled in the 14 booths at the Corporation Boys Higher Secondary School at Ramanathapuram in Coimbatore South Assembly segment. Booths in the Government Arts College looked deserted in the afternoon.
Party cadre at a polling station in SIHS Colony in Singanallur Assembly segment alleged poor involvement by the booth level staff in distributing booth slips. They claimed that many persons did not have booth slips and the cadre had a tough time going through the very long voters list to verify the names of the voters. “Some of them went back without voting,” a cadre claimed.
AIADMK cadre at Vilankurichi and Cheran Maa Nagar in the city, which come under Kavundampalayam Assembly constituency, used laptops to verify details of voters who did not have voters’ identity cards or booth slips. They downloaded details of nearly 23,000 voters in that locality, as published in the supplementary voters list. This saved time for the party cadre and voters as well.
Political parties violated the election norms and campaigned within the 200 meter boundary from the polling station. Some of these incidents – including ones at K.K. Pudur, Kottaimedu, Ganeshapuram and at Nirmala College – were taken to notice of the election officials and police, who went to there and chased away the campaigners.
Rathinapuri Police registered a case against driver of a BJP functionary for allegedly driving close to a polling station with the party flag on it. The police quoted the driver as saying that he was taking the vehicle to a workshop. However, a case was registered as this attracted a strong protest from other party representatives.
Neighbouring The Nilgiris district recorded an average of 70.53 polling and the three Assembly segments namely Udhagamandalam 68.61 per cent, Gudalur 72.37 and Coonoor recorded 70.81 per cent.
(With inputs from
V.S. Palaniappan,
Karthik Madhavan and M.K. Ananth)
