Odisha Panchayat Polls: Over 70% Turnout Once Again; SEC Says Violence-Free Fourth Phase

Bhubaneswar: Odisha once again recorded an impressive over 70 per cent turnout in the fourth phase of the panchayat elections, which was held on Tuesday. The State Election Commission (SEC) will release the detailed voting percentages later.

A 20 per cent turnout was recorded till 9 am, 36 per cent till 11 am and 45 per cent till 12 pm.

The state recorded 78.6 per cent turnout in the third phase of polling on February 20, 78.3 per cent in the second phase of polls on February 18 and 77.2 per cent in the first phase on February 16.

Only the last phase of the polls are now left, which will take place on February 24.

The SEC informed that there were no reports of violence during the fourth phase on Tuesday. Polling was cancelled in two places — for the post of Sarpanch in Kendrapara and post of Ward Member in Jajpur due to error in ballot papers.

Repolling will be held on February 23 (Wednesday) in 45 centres where disruptions had taken place in the first and second phase of the panchayat elections.

Polling began at 7 am on Tuesday and continued till 1 pm.

Odisha Police took all measures to make the fourth phase incident-free. A total of 257 platoons along with 1,473 mobile patrolling units were deployed.

Voting was held at 17,089 booths in 1,254 panchayats of 64 blocks of 27 districts. A total of 51,31,727 voters were eligible to exercise their franchise. A total of 2,563 booths were identified as sensitive.

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