Umerkote records 70% polling

Defying the poll boycott call given by Maoists, around 70 per cent voters exercised their franchise in the Umerkote assembly segment in Nabarangpur district, where the by-poll was held on Wednesday.

“The election was by and large peaceful. No untoward incident was reported anywhere in the constituency while the voters were seen to make long-queues to cast their vote,” said a senior government officer. The counting of vote will take place on December 4.

“The polling was very peaceful and there was no untoward incident reported during polling,” said deputy inspector general of police (Sunabeda) Soumendra Priyadarshi.

The by-election was necessary in the constituency, as sitting BJD MLA Jagabandhu Majhi was gunned down by unidentified miscreants on September 24 at Gona village under Raighar police station.

As many as 165,037 voters of the constituency, consisting of 24 GPs in Raighar block, eight GPs in Umerkote block and Umerkote NAC were to elect the new MLA of the constituency.

Three candidates were in the fray for this constituency- Dharmu Gond (BJP), Jatindranath Gond (Congress) and Subash Gond (BJD).

Security was tightened with deployment of Central security forces in Maoist-hit assembly constituency in the wake of the call given by the ultras to boycott the election.

At least three companies of Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), six units of Special Operation Group (SOG), 11 platoons of Orissa State Armed Police (OSAP) were deployed for poll duty besides hundreds of police officers, constables and home guards.

The Orissa-Chhattisgarh border was sealed to prevent the entry of miscreants from the neighbouring state.

Official sources said as many as 750 polling personnel were deployed for poll duty. Out of the total 162 booths in the constituency, 67 booths were identified as hyper-sensitive while remaining 70 booths are considered to be sensitive.

Though the poll result would not impact the political parties, they have taken the by-poll as a challenge.

Apart from several ministers of the ruling BJD, senior Congress and BJP leaders including BJP Chief Minister Raman Singh campaigned for their respective candidates.