Bypoll for Hamirpur assembly witnesses 51% voter turnout

Lucknow: Around 51 per cent voters of Hamirpur assembly segment exercised their franchise in the bypoll for the Vidhan Sabha seat, braving incessant rains on Monday.

No incident of violence or breach of law and order took place during the polling, said Assistant Chief Electoral Officer Arbind Kumar in a statement.

"Fifty-one per cent polling took place in the bypoll to Hamirpur Assembly constituency. The weather condition was rainy. No incident of violence or breach of law and order took place. Polling was peaceful," he said. Voting had begun on a slow pace at 7 am amid incessant rains on Monday. Election officials said paramilitary forces were deployed in adequate numbers to ensure peaceful bypoll.

The by-election was necessitated due to the disqualification of sitting Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA Ashok Kumar Singh Chandel following his conviction in a murder case.

Nine candidates are in the poll fray and prominent among them are Yuwraj Singh (BJP), Hardeepak Nishad (Congress), Manoj Kumar Prajapati (SP), Naushad Ali (BSP) and Jamal Alam Mansoori (Communist Party of India).

The electoral roll comprises over 4 lakh voters, with 2.20 lakh being males, 1.81 females and 10 of the third gender.

As many as 476 polling booths were set up in 257 polling centres, the election officials said here, adding VVPAT (Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail) machines were used at all polling booths.

Counting of votes will take place on September 27.