Polls underway for 6 Lok Sabha & 41 Assembly seats today in Odisha

Bhubaneswar: Fourth phase polls for 6 Lok Sabha and 41 Assembly seats are going on today in Odisha. The casting of votes commenced at 7 am in the morning. However, EVM malfunction was reported at multiple polling booths today. And 9 percent voter turnout recorded till 9 AM, as per the office of the Chief Electoral Officer, Odisha.

As per reports adequate security arrangements have been made to conduct polls. Today polls are going on districts such as Kendrapara, Jagatsinghpur, Mayurbhanj, Balasore, Bhadrak, and Jajpur.

Polling will continue till 6 pm. Over 95 lakh voters are casting their vote today at 10,792 booths. Out of the total voters, 49, 01,079 are male, 45,98,979 are female and 595 belong to the third gender.

While 52 candidates (40 male and 12 female) are in the fray for the six Lok Sabha seats, 336 candidates (301 male, 34 female, and one-third gender) are fighting for assembly seats.

Among the parliamentary constituencies, in the 4^th phase polls, Kendrapara is in focus. Here Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national vice-president Baijayant Panda will contest with BJD Rajya Sabha MP and Ollywood actor Anubhav Mohanty. Besides, Dharanidhar Nayak is contesting on Congress ticket for this segment.

In Mayurbhanj, BJD’s Debashis Marandi is fighting against BJP candidate Bishweshwar Tudu and Jharkhand Mukti Morcha’s (JMM) Anjani Soren, daughter of party chief Shibu Soren. Anjani is the JMM-Congress alliance candidate from the seat.

In Balasore BJD MP Rabindra Kumar Jena will fight against BJP’s Pratap Sarangi and Navajyoti Patnaik, son of Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) president Niranjan Patnaik.

Avimanyu Sethi, son of sitting MP Arjun Sethi, is contesting from Bhadrak Lok Sabha on BJP ticket. The senior Sethi quit the BJD and joined BJP after his son was denied a party ticket. The BJD has fielded Manjulata Mandal, spouse of sitting Dhamnagar MLA Muktikanta Mandal from the seat while Congress has fielded Madhumita Sethi, daughter of senior Congress leader Ananta Charan Sethi.

In Jajpur, former state administrative officer Sarmistha Sethi is contesting in BJD ticket. And from BJP Amiya Kanta Mallick contesting for the seat while from Congress Manas is contesting.

In Jagatsinghpur, BJD MLA from Tirtol Rajashri Mallick’s is up against BJP’s Bibhu Prasad Tarai and Congress’ Pratima Mallick.

When it comes to the Assembly segments, several ministers including Prafulla Samal (Bhandaripokhari), Anant Das (Bhograi), Shashi Bhusan Behera (Kendrapara), and Pratap Jena (Mahanga) are contesting in the fourth phase.

Odisha Pradesh Congress President Niranjan Patnaik is fighting from Bhandaripokhari seat against Minister Prafulla Samal.

Also read: 30 Percent Of Candidates In Odisha Assembly Polls Have Criminal Background:ADR