Counting of votes of for Gram Panchayats in Bidar district was over in five hours flat.
Officials in the counting centres started opening the Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) at 8 a.m. and by 1 p.m., all the 7. 5 lakh votes recorded in the machines were counted and recorded against the names of rspective candidates.
Bidar taluk was the first to complete counting at 12.30 p.m. and Bhalki was the last that ended half an hour later.
The announcement of results, however, took sometime as officials had to tabulate the votes as per the reservation matrix. This is the fastest counting since the setting up of Panchayats in 1991, Goutam Arali, Election Co-ordinator and EVM district trainer, said. “Needless to say, we are the first district in the state to complete counting,” he said.
Interesting cases
In Marakhal Gram Panchayat, a woman from the scheduled caste category won over all other candidates by one vote.
In Anadur Gram Panchayat, there was a tie between two candidates from the SC woman category. However, one of the candidates received a postal ballot and declared winner by one vote.
In Chillargi Gram Panchayat, followers of Hassan Patel, garlanded him, coloured his cheeks and lifted him up to celebrate. Only that the winner was his wife Kousar Begum. When asked, he only said his supporters were happy and wanted to celebrate. He assured that he would not interfere in his wife’s functioning as the GP member.
