AGARTALA, June 27 (TIWN): With a total of 92, 146 voters the 13-Pratapgarh constituency and the 46-Surma constituency on Saturday go for poll to decide the fate of the Tripura by-election aspirants. For the first of its kind from this year the candidates' images are displayed on the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs). However, four candidates from Congress, CPM and BJP are contesting for Surma while five candidates, including two independents, are fighting for Pratapgarh.As many as 50,004 voters, of which 24,492 are women, goes for exercising their franchise in 13-Pratapgarh SC reserved constituency while 42,142 voters, including 20,541 women, goes to cast vote in 46-Surma SC reserve assembly constituency on Saturday. The voting kicked off from 8:00 AM and would continue till 5:00 PM. Talking to TIWN on Saturday noon SDM (Sadar) Manik Lal Das told, “The voting at Pratapgarh constituency is underway and no specified complaint has been received yet.” Adding to that Das said, “Till 12:00 PM 31 per cent polling has been recorded at the constituency.” However, a section of voters at 26 number booths of the 13-Pratapgarh constituency on Saturday alleged, “A problem has been found at the EVM machine where the button of the congress candidate Ranjit Das was found not working.”

 In this regard SDM told TIWN, “The commission engineers has come to the booth and has found no problem with the EVM machine and had also handed over the certificate with the polling staffs in present of the Congress Polling agent Dhruba Chandra Basak.”Das said, “The polling agent of congress along with the BJP polling agent Amar Shah and the CPI-M polling agent Pritam Majumder are present at the polling booth.

”Besides, talking to TIWN SDM (Kamalpur) Ravel Hemandra Kumar said, “41 per cent polling has been recorded till 12:00 PM at 46-Surma constituency and there is no report any untoward incident.” 

He also said that till now there is no report any technical faults of the EVM machines here at the booths of the constituency.

“The peaceful voting at the 46-Surma Constituency is underway,” said SDM Kamalpur. Polling is under way at 115 polling stations in Pratapgarh and Surma assembly segments. Central paramilitary forces and Tripura State Rifles troopers have been deployed to hold the by-polls free and fare.

A large number of voters witnessed queued up at the polling stations of the two constituencies, but interestingly according to the report a low number of voters on Saturday turned up to caste vote at the city areas here under the Pratapgarh constituency.

According to the official, 61 polling stations of Pratapgarh constituency, eight were categorized as sensitive. In Surma, of the 54 polling stations four were categorized as hypersensitive, 23 as sensitive for security reasons. The central paramilitary forces along with the BSFs and the local police are deployed on Saturday to restrict any untoward incidents during the poll.

However, this year for the first time candidates' images would be displayed on EVMs. "The images would be displayed in the middle of the party symbol and the candidates' names in the EVMs following a Supreme Court direction to avoid confusion among the voters," said State election commissioner S K Rakesh earlier.

The entire election procedure will be completed by July 2, 2015. The counting of votes would be held on June 30.