Mumbai’s Andheri (East) Assembly byelection | 3.61% voter turnout recorded till 9 a.m.
The Hindu
Additional Chief Secretary and Chief Electoral Officer, Maharashtra, Shrikanth Deshpande said polling started as per the schedule and no EVMs malfunction was reported so far.
Mumbai’s Andheri (East) Assembly bypoll has recorded a voter turnout of 3.61% till 9 a.m. There are 2,71,502 electorates in the cosmopolitan Assembly segment. Polling will conclude at 6 p.m.
Speaking to The Hindu, Additional Chief Secretary and Chief Electoral Officer, Maharashtra, Shrikanth Deshpande, said polling started as per the schedule and no EVMs malfunction was reported so far. He appealed to voters of Andheri (East) to come in large numbers to exercise their franchise.
The polling started on a dull note with low voter participation in the early hours. It began at 7 a.m. in all the 256 polling stations, but voters appear to be apathetic to exercise their franchise.
With the Bharatiya Janata Party not in fray, for Uddhav Thackeray’s candidate Rutuja Ramesh Latke, the election is a mere formality with six other candidates – four of them independent, having little significance.
The byelection was necessitated due to the sudden death of Ms. Latke’s husband and Shiv Sena legislator Ramesh Latke following a cardiac arrest in May.
State government declared a public holiday for the Andheri (East) Assembly constituency on November 3 to enable voters to cast their votes.
The holiday will be applicable to Central and State government offices, semi-government offices, public enterprises, banks, and others. It will also apply to voters who work outside the limits of the Assembly constituency.