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Bhubaneswar: Nearly 68% voters on Thursday exercised their franchise in the urban local body (ULB) polls in Odisha where polling by and large passed off peacefully with no major incident reported from any place, an official engaged in the polling process said.
Barring stray incident like electronic voting machine (EVM) glitches in Vyasnagar municipality of Jajpur district where re-polling would be conducted on Friday, the polling went off peacefully, he said.
Jajpur district collector informed that due to EVM issues it has been decided to conduct re-polling in booth no. 32 and 33 of ward no. 20 on Friday and counting for the municipality would be held on Saturday.
The decision came after the EVMs at polling station number 32 and 33 of ward number 20 went defunct sometime after the polling started at 8am.
However, as per the poll schedule announced by State Election Commission (SEC), results of the urban local bodies would be declared on Friday.
According to reports reaching here issues relating to defunct EVMs were also reported from Koraput, Konark, Balasore, Puri and Nabrangpur.
In Puri, an independent candidate and his supporters gheraoed a presiding officer alleging that despite issues with the EVM, the officer allowed the voters to continue the process.
Similarly in Nabrangpur, one Mohana Rrao was arrested for allegedly misbehaving a magistrate in ward no.1.
An estimated 18 lakh voters cast ballots in 1,968 booths to elect 1,103 ward members in 65 ULBs where voting was held.
