Polling for the politically crucial states of Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand took place on Wednesday as the ruling Samajwadi Party and Congress party in the respective states try to retain power but are getting challenged by Bharatiya Janata Party in both the states.
Polling in the hill state of Uttarakhand and second phase of western Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday saw high voter turnouts at 68% and 65.5% respectively.
In UP, People voted in 67 constituencies across 11 districts. The districts where polling were held included Bijnor, Saharanpur, Moradabad, Sambhal, Rampur, Bareilly, Amroha, Pilibhit, Kheri, Shahjahanpur and Badaun.
A total of 2.28 crore voters, including over 1.04 crore women, are eligible to cast their ballots in 14,771 polling centres and 23,693 polling stations in the second of the seven-phase polling.
“Polling was held peacefully amid tight security,” UP Chief Electoral Officer T Venkatesh said.
“Seized cash worth Rs.16.52 crores, 3.29 lakh litre liquor, 1.9 kg gold and drugs worth Rs 1.16 crore,” said Election Commissioner, Vijay Dev.
Voting in Uttarakhand’s 69 constituencies spread across 13 districts recorded 68 percent voter turnout.
“This time Uttarakhand voter turn-out has been the highest ever. The turnout was 68% and in many number of polling stations there were long queues so it is likely to go higher. In the 2012 elections the turnout was 67.22% and 62.15% in 2014 general elections,” said Sandeep Saxena, deputy election commissioner.
He added, “Polling in Uttarakhand went by peacefully. There was no incident of violence and intimidation that was reported.”
In the run up to the poll, cash worth Rs 3.38 crore and narcotics worth Rs 37.23 lakh were seized.
