NEW DELHI: The Naxal belts of Maharashtra recorded the highest voter turnout on Wednesday while it was the lowest in Mumbai and its neighbouring urban Assembly segments even as the overall polling percentage in the state stood at 65.02 per cent, much higher than the 2019 poll count of 61.74 per cent.
Jharkhand witnessed 68.45 per cent polling in the second and final phase of the elections for 38 of the 81 Assembly seats, surpassing the 2019 figure of 67.04 per cent.
In Uttar Pradesh, where the Assembly byelections were held on nine seats, several reports of people not being allowed to vote and “arbitrary checking” of ID proof by the local administration came to light. This led to the suspension of police personnel in Moradabad, Kanpur and Muzaffarnagar.
In Maharashtra, where all 288 seats went to the polls in a single phase, Naxal hotbed Gadchiroli recorded 73.3 per cent polling while the upscale Colaba in south Mumbai saw only 41 per cent voting. Other seats in Gadchiroli district like Chimur, Brahmapuri and Armori saw 81.7 per cent, 80.5 per cent and 74.5 per cent polling, respectively.
The Nagpur division also saw poor voting, with Nagpur South West seat Maharashtra Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis is a five-time MLA from here recording 51 per cent turnout. Other seats like Nagpur West, South, North, East and Central also recorded a turnout in the range of 50 per cent to 55 per cent.
In Jharkhand, Jamtara recorded the highest turnout of 77 per cent, followed by Pakur, Deoghar, Ranchi and Dumka at 76 per cent, 72 per cent, 72 per cent and 71 per cent, respectively.
With today’s polling, the elections concluded in Jharkhand and Maharashtra, and bypolls in 48 Assembly seats and two parliamentary constituencies of Wayanad and Nanded across 15 states. The seizures during the elections stood at Rs 1,139 crore. In Jharkhand and Maharashtra, the combined seizure of Rs 914.18 crore is more than 7.5 times the 2019 figure.