Voting has concluded in Mumbai’s Andheri (East) Assembly constituency, with the lowest turnout of 31.74%.
No major political party was in the fray other than Rutuja Ramesh Latke, the candidate nominated by the Uddhav Thackeray camp of the Shiv Sena. Ms. Latke is the widow of former Shiv Sena MLA from the Andheri (East) constituency, Ramesh Latke. The bypoll was necessitated by his death in May 2022 following a heart attack.
The cosmopolitan Assembly segment has 2,71,502 registered voters, mostly lower middle class and middle class. Of them, only around 86,000 voters participated in the poll.
Polling began at 7 a.m. and continued till 6 p.m. at 256 polling booths. The day started on a dull note with 3.61% voter turnout in the first two hours. At 11 a.m., 9.72% voting was recorded; at 1 p.m., it was 16.89%; the turnout was 22.85% till 3 p.m.,; and an hour before the deadline at 5 p.m., it was 28.77%.
Earlier in the day, Ms. Latke exercised her franchise at the Chinai College booth.
Andheri (East) Assembly constituency byelection
There are 2,71,502 registered voters and the majority of them are lower middle class and middle-class
It has around one lakh Marathi voters, followed by 48,000 each of north Indian and Muslims
According to the local leaders, 35,000 electors are Gujaratis, Marwaris and Jains
There are more than 16,000 south Indian voters and an equal number of Christian voters
There are 256 polling booths in the Andheri (East) constituency and polling will be held till 6 p.m.
Counting of votes will be taken up on November 6
Speaking to The Hindu, Additional Chief Secretary and Chief Electoral Officer, Maharashtra, Shrikanth Deshpande, said polling went off peacefully and as per schedule. “However, the overall turnout was very low,” he said.
Mr. Deshpande said no untoward incident had been reported and no issues had been brought to his notice with regard to malfunctioning of EVMs or any other malpractices.
Counting of votes will be taken up on November 6.
The run-up to the byelection saw much political drama. Ms. Latke, an employee of the BMC, approached the Bombay High Court on October 12 as the civic authority was not accepting her resignation. The next day, the court directed the BMC to issue a letter of acceptance to Ms. Latke, paving the way for her to file the nomination papers. The Uddhav group also alleged she was being pressured to contest as the candidate of the Chief Minister Eknath Shinde faction of Shiv Sena.
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