Security personnel assisting the elderly at Nutan Vidyalaya polling station in Kalaburagi on Wednesday. | Photo Credit: ARUN KULKARNI
Women in the queue at Nutan Vidyalaya Girls School polling station waiting for their turn to exercise their franchise in Kalaburagi on Wednesday. | Photo Credit: ARUN KULKARNI
Elderly couple after exercising the franchise at High School (beside tahsildar office) polling station in Kalaburagi on Wednesday. | Photo Credit: ARUN KULKARNI
Kalaburagi district, comprising nine Assembly constituencies, recorded a voter turnout of 60.92% on Wednesday. Except for a few incidents, polling for the elections was peaceful in all nine Assembly constituencies in the district.
Kalaburagi district recorded 17.95% polling till 11 a.m. The scorching heat did not deter the voters from exercising their franchise. Even though the voting started at a brisk pace with polling percentage reaching 32.69% by 1 p.m., it hovered at 58% by 3 p.m. and it was 60.92% by the end of polling at 6.00 p.m.
Sedam recorded the highest polling percentage of 68.63% and Kalaburagi South recorded 53.88 – the lowest voting among the segments.
The polling turnout in Chincholli was 62.95% followed by Jewargi with 62.51%. Aland recorded 58.85%, Kalaburagi Rural and Chittapur recorded 55.8% , and Kalaburagi North recorded 51.82%.
Malfunctioning of a Voter-Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) unit at Sharada PU College polling booth in Kalaburagi disrupted polling briefly for 20 minutes.
In Afzalpur Constituency, verbal clashes erupted between workers of BJP and Congress, when a women BJP worker- Pushpavathi Thakur, outside the polling booth was seen forcing voters to choose BJP.
AICC president Mallikarjun Kharge along with his wife Radhabai Kharge cast their votes at Basava Nagar polling booth in the city.
Political leaders and candidates of various parties along with family members reached the polling booths in their respective constituencies.
