Team Herald
PANJIM: Goa, once again proved its credentials as a State with a high voting percentage when on Saturday more than 81 percent of the voters turned out to vote for a new government. By evening, the fate of 251 candidates had been sealed in the electronic voting machines, which will now be opened only on March 11.
At 5 pm, when polls ended the turnout was given as 83 percent, almost 1.27 percent more than the 2012 elections. However, later the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) said that the final percentage and statistics would be provided later in the night. Till the time of goining to press the figure released was 81.08 per cent.
The high percentage of voting has fueled speculation as to whether it is a vote for anti-incumbency or a certificate to the work of BJP-led State government.
North Goa having 5.09 lakh voters spread across 19 Assembly constituencies recorded 82.93 percent turnout while South with 5.98 lakh voters covering 21 constituencies recorded 79.24 percent.
The Election Commission’s new initiative of pink women polling booths recorded two to five percent higher turnout compared to other polling booths. Except for one or two minor unlawful incidents, the entire polling was peaceful.
Polling had to be canceled in polling station 8 of Margao constituency as the polling officer followed the wrong procedure. A repoll has been ordered in this polling station at Aquem having 788 votes.
“I would like to place my appreciation to the people of Goa, who supported our effort and came out in large number and voted. I would also like to appreciate the hard work of our polling officials who were working day and night to make the election a success,” CEO Kunal told media persons on Saturday late night.
Kunal said that the Election Commission had introduced phone call based record monitoring system to get the updates on polling at all 1642 polling stations in one go.
“The pink polling booth recorded two to five percent more turnout compared to other polling booths. We had large participation of female voters and large number of female voters,” he said adding that first time female voters were gifted with teddy bears.
Divyang polling booth manned by disabled people located at Ribandar registered 85 percent polling – higher than the State and district average.
Polling that began at 7.00am at 1642 polling booths initially faced several technical glitches with regards to EVM machines and use of VVPAT – Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail which was introduced for the first time in the State.
During the entire polling process, 19 ballot units and 31 control units of EVMs were replaced during mock polling and at time of polling process two ballot units and three control units were replaced. In case of VVPAT – during mock polling 21 and during polling 12 units were replaced.
Polling, which went on smoothly till 7.00pm at several locations, was webcast by the CEO. However due to poor signal quality, several interior polling booths could not get connected thereby affecting the feed.
Polling was peaceful throughout Goa barring some minor stray incidents. In an unfortunate incident 73-year-old Dr Leslie Saldanha collapsed at the entrance of the polling station due to cardiac arrest and later expired at the hospital.
