Mumbai witnesses 55 per cent polling

Mumbai: Braving the hot sun, Mumbaikars from various social strata — from politicians, film stars, business tycoons, sportspersons to youngsters and slum dwellers — hit the roads on Monday to celebrate the festival of democracy. Barring few incidents of VVPAT machines acting up, the polling went off smoothly in the city.

Mumbai recorded 55.11  per cent polling, which is slightly higher than the voting percentage of 51.59 in the 2014 polls.

This is the highest voting turnout in last 15 years in Mumbai. In 2004, the city had recorded only 47.2 per cent voting and it further came down to 44.2 per cent in 2009.

Since 7 am, when voting started, the enthusiasm among the electorate was palpable. There were serpentine queues at several places with first-time voters coming out in large numbers.

At some places, however, voters faced problems due to electronic voting machine (EVM) glitches. They either had to wait to cast their votes for up to one-and-half hour or had to come back to their respective polling booth later in the day, as the EVM machines were not ready to accept votes on time.

“The manual system was more efficient than these machines. I was hoping of avoiding queues due to health issues, but exactly the opposite happened. We are being made to stand for such a long time,” said Rehana Bi (62), a housewife who had come with her husband to Foras Road. The EVM at this booth started working only at 8.30 am.

“I was on the night shift and came directly to the polling booth but it’s been around 20 minutes and the EVM is still not ready. So I am going back and will return later to cast my vote,” said Faiyaz Ansari, who had come to vote at the polling booth at Tardeo bus depot. The EVM at this booth was made available for casting votes at 7.30 am.

The four neighbouring constituencies of Mumbai also went off without any untoward incident. While Thane and Kalyan recorded 49.95  and 44.27  per cent polling respectively, Palghar and Bhiwandi registered  64.09  and 53.68  per cent polling. In Dombivali, which falls in the Kalyan constituency, there were complaints of technical glitches in the EVMs, due to which voters had to wait in queues for a long time. Some of them also complained of their names not figuring in the voters’ list.

The overall percentage in the 17 seats when polling ended at 6 pm was 57 per cent, compared to 55.83 per cent in these seats during the 2014 elections. The Nandurbar seat recorded the highest poll-ing percentage, 67.64, whil-e Kalyan saw the lowest.

NCP president Sharad Pawar, Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray and Union minister Smriti Irani were prominent among political leaders who voted in Mumbai. MNS president Raj Thackeray and his wife Sharmila waited for over an hour at a polling centre in Shivaji Park area to cast their votes. Uddhav Thackeray, his wife Rashmi and son Aaditya cast their votes at a municipal school in Bandra East.

Several business tycoons such as Mukesh and Anil Ambani, Anand Mahindra and Adi Godrej lined up outside booths, many of them located inside civic schools.