Samikhsya Bureau
Amid tight security the polling in the first phase elections to four Lok Sabha and 28 Assembly constituencies in Odisha began at 0700 hours.
Today’s polling will seal the fate of 28 candidates for the Lok Sabha and 191 candidates for the Assembly seats in mostly the south Odisha,dominated by the BJD in the 2014 elections.
The four Lok Sabha constituencies where polling began at 07 00 hours are Nabarangpur, Koraput, Kalahandi and Berhampur.Polling also simultaneously commenced for the 28 Assembly seats falling under these four parliamentary constituencies.
CEO office sources here said the polling began peacefully in the area notwithstanding a poll boycott call by the left wing extremism and the authority had deployed central paramilitary forces in the all the sensitive booths in the Maoist infested areas in Nabarangpur, Koraput and Kalahandi districts.
Reports reaching here said by 1000 hours about ten per cent polling has been reported from the Lok Sabha and Assembly constituencies and a large number of voters were seen in the long line before the polling booths to cast their ballots.
However, at many places, the voting was delayed and stopped in the midway due to a technical snag in the EVM and VVPAT machines.
Altogether, 60,03,707 voters including 3030222 female voters would exercise their franchise today spread over 7233 polling booths out of which as many as 2375 booths are considered as sensitive booths where the CRPF forces were deployed.
The authority had installed CCTV cameras webcasting and videography in the hypersensitive booths. Micro observers are being posted at 408 booths. At least 29 platoons of CRPF have been deployed in the area.
