Arrangnts complete for LB polls counting, repoll peaceful: SEC

Hyderabad, July 3 (UNI) All arrangements have been put in place to undertake the counting of votes polled in the two-tier elections to the Panchayatraj institutions.

Arrangements were made for the exercise to be carried out in 493 counting centres under the supervision of 443 district-level officers, 22 state-level election observers and an equal number of expenditure observers amid tight security, State Election Commissioner G N Rao told reporters here.

The counting of votes polled in the two-tier elections to the Panchayatraj institutions will start at 0800 hrs tomorrow with segregation, bundling of ballot papers of 25 each, mixing of ballot bundles to avoid identification of voters. The actual counting process would start in the afternoon and lead position would be known in the evening and results of all the 1087 ZPTC seats and 15,577 MPTC seats, the following day.

Meanwhile, repolling in the 68 polling stations in nine districts of the state went off peacefully.

More than 70 per cent voters exercised their franchise in the repoll in 32 polling stations in Guntur where violence left one person dead and injuring several persons.

The repoll was peaceful also in 14 polling booths in Chittoor, five each in Mahaboobnagar and Srikakulam, three each in Nellore, Rangareddy and Warangal, two in Khammam and one in Nizamabad as police made unprecedented security.

Over 72 per cent of the voters cast their ballot in the second phase polling in 11 districts with Warangal recording a high 76.97 per cent and Srikakulam registering a low of 67.45 per cent. The Sunday's poll was incident-free in Visakhapatnam as also West Godavari.

UNI SM ROY MA RN1903