As many as 96,736 voters (60.14%) exercised their franchise in the Ullal by-polls on Saturday. There are 1,60,862 voters in the assembly constituency.
   Speaking to Deccan Herald, Deputy Commissioner M Maheshwar said that the by-polls were peaceful with no untoward incident reporting in any part of the constituency.
   Though the polling began in a slow pace in the morning amidst tight security, it gained momentum in the afternoon. In fact, till noon, the poll percentage had not crossed even 40 per cent.
No proxy voting
   As the Election Commission was firm on not allowing voters without Election Photo ID Card (EPIC), the chances of proxy voting was said to be almost nil. However, a few persons tried to cast votes on behalf of their brothers or cousins who are working abroad. But, the alert police caught them and later released them. “I could make out from his very face that he is not a eligible voter,” a policeman told Deccan Herald, after he stopped a boy who looks bearly 13 or 14 years old. The person, Asphak, arrived at the polling booth 88 in Ullal, on behalf of his brother Mohammed who is working in the Gulf.
   Out of the total 1,60,862 voters, 15,733 voters were not issued voter ID cards and only they were allowed to cast their votes after they produced one of the 14 documents to prove that he/she is a valid voter.
Voters not allowed
   A number of voters could not exercise their franchise as either their names were missing in the voter list though they had a voter ID card. Many a voters could not exercise their franchise as they had lost their voter ID cards.
   Mr Ismail (46) and his wife Shafia (31) could not exercise their franchise though they had the voter ID card. “The polling officials told us that our names are not there in the list. Hence, we could not vote,” the couple said and added that they had exercised their franchise in the previous polls (2004) without any problems.
   Similar was the case with many other voters across the constituency. In many a cases, the names of voters or their parents were wrongly printed and they too were not allowed to exercise their franchise.
   According to sources, BJP workers protested when Congress candidate U T Khader was found speaking on his mobile phone in a polling booth at BM School at Ullal. However, the police managed to take control over the situation immediately.
Tight security
   About 1,100 police personnel including 25 mobile patrol units and 7 special striking forces were deputed for the smooth conduct of polls.
   Out of the 140 polling booths, 56 were identified as hyper-sensitive, 70 as sensitive and 14 as ordinary. The tight security yielded good results as no untoward incident was reported. Several check posts were set up and the policemen maintained a strict vigil on vehicles bearing outstation numbers.
   Speaking to Deccan Herald, Superintendent of Police B Dayanand and IGP (Western Range) H N Satyanarayana Rao who are camping in Ullal, said that no untoward incidents were reported throughout the day.
   The counting will be held on June 5.