4th part sees 73 per cent turnout amid violence

By Express News Service

BHUBANESWAR: The fourth part panchayat polls on Tuesday recorded a voters turnout of 73 per cent amid sporadic violence reported from totally different locations throughout the State.

State Election Commissioner (SEC) Aditya Prasad Padhi instructed mediapersons that poll-related violence was reported in 4 to 5 locations.

Steps for re-polling will likely be taken on the locations after receiving reviews from the district collectors. The spotlight of the fourth part polling was the spectacular 75 per cent voter turnout in Nagada village of Jajpur district which was in information for excessive poverty and malnutrition just a few years again.

Similarly, 80 per cent of the voters exercised their franchise in Maoist-affected Trilochanpur village in Niyamgiri. The SEC mentioned polling was performed within the two locations after a niche of 20 years as they have been inaccessible owing to lack of communication.

Meanwhile, six individuals together with 4 girls have been injured in a conflict between two teams at Bideipur village in Basudevpur block of Bhadrak district. Besides, presiding and polling officers have been additionally overwhelmed up by villagers over alleged ballot-box tampering in Ward 10 of Kumarpur panchayat in Basudevpur.

Besides, a BJD employee Pradyumna Tripathy sustained essential accidents in poll-related violence in Panikipalli space below Sohela block of Bargarh district through the fourth part of the polls.

Tripathy was rushed to Sohela CHC and later shifted to VSS Medical College and Hospital, Burla. Clashes between BJD and BJP employees have been reported from a number of areas of the State. Voters of a number of villages in Malkangiri district boycotted the polls.