The first phase of polling of Gujarat elections saw an average voter turnout of 60.11 per cent, the provisional data showed. The compilation of the data continued till late evening.
The voter turnout, however, was substantially lower than 68.33 per cent recorded in the previous elections of 2017.
The first phase of polling was held on 89 seats of 19 districts in Saurashtra and South Gujarat regions from 8 am on Thursday.
In a statement, after the conclusion of first phase of polling, the office of Chief Electoral Officer stated that total 89 ballot units, 82 control units and 238 VVPATs were replaced in 19 districts during the polling.
After an encouraging start of the polling earlier in the day, the pace of voting had lost steam towards the end of the day. The Election Commission data showed average voter turnout of 48.48 per cent till 3 pm, which means the subsequent two hours saw moderate addition to the total voting.
Urban concentration
The districts with urban concentration and municipal corporation areas recorded voter turnout in the range of 56-60 per cent. These include Surat (60.01 per cent), Rajkot (57.68 per cent), Bhavnagar (57.81per cent), Jamnagar (56.09 per cent) and Junagadh (56.95 per cent).
The prominent constituencies where the political parties were contesting a battle of prestige such as Majura seat in Surat, where BJP’s sitting MLA and MoS Home Harsh Shanghvi is contesting, recorded 55.39 per cent turnout, while voter turnout in Rajkot West constituency was recorded at 55.50 per cent. The seat was earlier represented by former Chief Minister Vijay Rupani.
Maximum voter turnout was recorded in the tribal districts of Narmada (73.02 per cent), Tapi (72.32 per cent), Valsad (65.29 per cent) and Navsari (66.62 per cent). Morbi district, where the tragic bridge collapse incident took place killing 135, recorded a relatively higher voter turnout of 67.65 per cent.
Bogus voting
The polling across the regions was largely peaceful, barring some technical glitches and allegations of booth capturing and bogus voting raised by the Congress.
The Election Commission statement said, it received 33 alerts, 104 complaints received by the Office of the Chief Electoral Officer and 221 complaints received by c-VIGIL.
The second phase of polling for 93 seats will take place on December 5 and the counting of votes will be done on December 8.