9 hours Ago By Shariq Majeed
Ludhiana: Not even half of the total registered voters turned out for the MC election on Saturday. Voting percentage in municipal councils and nagar panchayat was much higher. The situation this time was in stark contrast with the 2018 MC elections.
The district election office report pegged the final turnout for MC Ludhiana election at 46.95%, with men accounting for 48.37% and women for 45.
34%. As compared to the 2018 MC elections, voting percentage for Ludhiana MC was 12.13% less this time than in 2018, when it was 59.
08%. The report said that voter percentage for Ludhiana MC was 15.99% at the outset.
It increased to 29.87% by 1pm and 43.37% at 3pm before increasing by around 3.
58% in the last hour of polling. A source in the district administration attributed the poor voter turnout to cold weather, martyrdom days of the Sahibzadas as well as missing votes. He added that low turnout was surprising as generally, turnout picks up in the last hour of voting.
Among the three municipal councils, Machhiwara witnessed the highest voter turnout of 69.01%, followed by MC Sahnewal (61.41%) and MC Mullanpur Dakha (60.
13%). In by-elections of one ward each of MC Khanna and MC Samrala, the voter turnout was 53.71% and 65.
25% respectively. The report stated that the highest polling percentage of 79.46% was recorded in the Malaud nagar panchayat.
Tejinder Singh, a Malaud resident, attributed the higher turnout to enthusiasm among voters. He said that since the last election was held around seven years ago, people had waited a long time to get their issues redressed. 80 years old Shanti Devi of Guru Colony in Machhiwara, who along with her daughter Gunwanti had come to vote at Government Senior Secondary School Boys Machhiwara said that they are facing garbage issue and there is a problem related to streetlights as well in their area.
She added that they came to vote to elect a representative who solves the issues. At Malaudh, 84-year-old Dev Raj of Somal Kheri, who had come to vote at the polling booth of FCI godown complex, said that he had been exercising his franchise for more than 50 years and on Saturday, he had been waiting from 7am to cast his vote. Listing the issues related to Malaudh, 67-year-old Harnek Singh, who has been living in New York with his son for 16 years, said that he returned two months ago and cast his vote in the morning.
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