Voter turnout scales a new height in Hoskote taluk

The Hoskote Assembly constituency in Bangalore Rural district has recorded 90.60 per cent voter turnout, the highest in Karnataka.

More than 25 booths have recorded 95 pc voting and at least six have crossed the 98 pc mark. Ralakunte near Hoskote recorded the highest voting with 98.58 pc, followed by Isthur village with 98.36 pc turnout.

Thimmapppanahalli recorded 98.23 pc voting, while Bendiganahalli, the native village of Minister B N Bache Gowda, recorded 98.02 pc voting.

Of the 224 polling stations in the constituency, 105 were identified hypersensitive. Considering the past history of violent incidents during voting, the Election Commission had deployed more than 200 micro observers to monitor the voting process this time.

“The constituency has a total of 1.82 lakh voters. As many as 86,212 women and 85,482 men exercised their franchise on May 5. The numbers do not include postal ballots and service votes,” T Shamaiah, Joint Chief Electoral Officer, said. According to the Election
Commission, the postal ballots total 1.5 lakh and service ballots 37,000, he added.

In fact, Hoskote has always been known for good voter turnout.

The constituency recorded 80 pc voting in the previous Assembly elections with some of the booths registering cent percent turnout.

Shamaiah attributed the good voter response to thrust on revision of electoral rolls, campaign on importance of voting launched by the Election Commission and deployment of paramilitary personnel.

Kolar (87 pc), Chikkaballapur and Malur (86 pc) are the other constituencies which witnessed enthusiastic voter performance in the Assembly election.

Of the total 223 Assembly constituencies which went to polls, 47 have recorded 80 pc voting this time.