Voters' turn out in the rural pockets of the district remained brisk as several polling booths attracted steady stream of electorate lined up to exercise their franchise, as phase- I of local body elections passed off peacefully on Monday.
Armed with booth slips and electronic photo identity cards, young, middle-aged and senior citizens in the rural segments of the district made it a point to carry out their democratic right even though the euphoria that was noticed during the Assembly elections was missing.
Women came out in good numbers in several areas to cast their vote in the rural booths where ballot papers were used as the voters had to exercise their franchise for four candidates. Voter turn out was equally impressive in areas with sizeable presence of members of the minority community such as Inamkulathur, Puthanatham and Thuvarankurichi.
The poll percentage in panchayats unions, town panchayats and the two municipalities of Manapparai and Thuvakudi witnessed a steady increase as the day passed on and at about 1 p.m. the figures reached 45 per cent with respect to panchayats, 51 per cent in the case of town panchayats and 47 per cent for municipalities.
Extra strength was deployed at various places in the district including Inamkulathur, Puthanatham, Manapparai, Valanadu, Tiruverumbur, Somarasampet, Thuvarankurichi, Gundur and Kodiyalam with police personnel swinging into action bringing things under control whenever complaints of canvassing inside the booths were brought to their notice.
Police personnel with vehicles were deployed at vantage points to attend to any exigency. National Cadet Corps cadets, ex-servicemen and personnel from the Forest and Fire and Rescue Services Departments were also engaged for bandobust duty in the phase – I poll.
Polling was disrupted for about an hour at Kuvalakudi village panchayat near Tiruverumbur in the morning following opposition from some of the candidates and locals over the discrepancy in the order of the candidates names pasted in front of the polling station and those in the ballot papers. However, officials clarified that the order of the candidates names pasted in front and those in the ballot papers need not be the same as per a government order issued recently.
District Collector Jayashree Muralidharan inspected some of the booths including those at Ramji Nagar and Pothamettupatti.
