An estimated 71% of the over 2.44 lakh voters exercised their franchise on Saturday amid tight security in the election to Odisha’s Patkura Assembly seat, where polling had been postponed twice in the past two months.
Polling was peaceful and brisk despite intermittent drizzling and overcast skies. Long queues of voters were sighted in each of the 309 polling booths in the constituency.
Around 71% turnout was recorded at 6 p.m. and the final percentage was likely to go up as a large number of voters waited in the queue, Deputy Collector (Election) Sambit Satpathy said.
Polling was delayed at seven polling stations due to malfunctioning of EVMs and resumed after the glitches were rectified, Kendrapara Collector Samarth Verma said.
10 candidates in fray
The constituency, which comes under the Kendrapara Lok Sabha seat, witnessed high-voltage campaign with the ruling Biju Janata Dal and the Opposition — Bharatiya Janata Party and Congress — as major contenders. A total of 10 candidates were in the fray.
While the BJD had fielded Mr. Agarwalla’s widow Sabitri Agarwalla as its nominee, senior leader Bijoy Mohapatra was the BJP nominee and Jayanta Mohanty was the Congress candidate.
All three candidates had engaged their senior leaders in their campaign to woo the voters. The campaigning in the constituency virtually continued since April till it ended two days ago.
While Union Ministers Dharmendra Pradhan and Pratap Sarangi campaigned for Mr. Mohapatra and Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee president Niranjan Patnaik sought votes for Mr. Mohanty, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik had organised a roadshow in the constituency to seek votes for Ms. Agarwalla.
The counting of the votes will be done on July 24. The outcome will be crucial for Mr. Mohapatra who has failed to win any Assembly election since the BJD ticket given to him to contest from Patkura was cancelled at the last minute before the 2000 Assembly elections in the State.
(With PTI inputs)
