Guwahati: Around 12.86% voter turnout was recorded in Gossaigaon, Bhabanipur, Tamulpur, Mariani and Thowra assembly seats in Assam bye-elections on Saturday in the first four hours.
Around 7.96 lakh voters will decide the electoral fate of 31 candidates in the five assembly seats that fell vacant due to resignations and the deaths of MLAs.
The ruling BJP has fielded its candidates in three seats leaving the other two to alliance partner UPPL.
The Congress put up nominees in all five, while its former allies, the AIUDF and the BPF, are contesting in two and one seats, respectively.
The prominent contestants include BJP’s Rupjyoti Kurmi, Sushanta Borgohain, Phanidhar Talukdar; Congress’ Luhit Konwar and Jowel Tudu; AIUDF’s Jubbar Ali and Khairul Anam Khandakar and Jiron Basumatary of the UPPL.
Voting began at 7 am will take place till 5 pm while counting will be held on November 2.
Personnel of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) have been deployed at each polling station while webcasting will be done in all the 1,176 polling stations for monitoring the voting process live on October 30, as per the EC’s direction.
In the 126-seat Assam Assembly, the ruling BJP has 59 MLAs, its allies AGP and UPPL nine and five MLAs each.
The opposition Congress has 27, AIUDF 15, BPF three and CPI (M) one MLA, besides an Independent legislator.
