After more than 24 hours since the polls concluded in Delhi, the Election Commission today told that the voter turnout was 62.59 per cent, which is around 5 per cent less than the last Assembly elections which marked 67.5 per cent.
EC officials also told that the voting per cent is about 2 per cent more than the last Lok Sabha elections.
“Ballimaran had the highest voter turnout at 71.58 per cent. Delhi cantonment area recorded lowest voter turnout at 45.36 per cent,” the Chief Election Officer Ranbir Singh said.
Okhla constituency which includes Shaheen Bagh — which has been the hotbed of the anti-CAA protest in the country where protesters have staged a sit-in for over 50 days — has witnessed a voter turnout of 58.8 per cent, EC informed.
Election officials said it took time to collect data and accuracy was their top priority which resulted in the delay in giving the final figures.
The Election Commission officials also responded on the allegations leveled by AAP of efforts being made to tamper with the Electronic Voting Machine and tweeted videos to support their claim, by saying, “The videos are of unused EVMs. We got data from 13,780 booths and followed due process. Polling agents were shown proof and accuracy is our top priority.”
The exit polls after the voting concluded on Saturday showed AAP coming comfortably back in power with an average prediction of 45 to 50 seats in the 70 seats constituency. BJP is expected to show improvement by bagging 15 to 20 seats, while the Congress might again disappoint with predicted 0 to 2 seats.
In the tripartite contest, BJP and AAP were competing at the forefront with massive campaigning been done by top leaders of both the parties in the national capital.
The delay in the release of the final voting percentage was in question by the AAP leaders as its convener termed it ‘absolutely shocking’. He even suspected of EVM tampering in the pretext of delay in voter turnout percentage.
However, the Election Commission official clarified in the press conference that the data of voter turnout was already given the candidates.