Voters in Kerala remain glued to television sets and social media platforms as the counting of votes polled in the April 26 Lok Sabha elections in the southern State began in counting halls across 20 centres on Tuesday morning.
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The process kicked off with the counting of postal ballots at 8 a.m. The counting of votes polled in the electronic voting machines (EVM) will commence at 8.30 a.m.
Initial trends are expected to emerge by 9 a.m., Chief Electoral Officer Sanjay Kaul had said on Monday. The final results are expected to be out by late afternoon today, according to election officials.
In the Phase II, April 26 elections, 71.27% of the 2,77,49,159-strong electorate had cast their votes in the State’s 20 Lok Sabha constituencies.
Given the three-cornered nature of the electoral battles in constituencies such as Thiruvananthapuram and Thrissur, the Kerala results are awaited with great interest. Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) and the CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF) entered the 2024 poll battle scene with 18 and two seats respectively. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) also harbours strong hopes this time, having fielded Union Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar against Congress’s sitting MP Shashi Tharoor in Thiruvananthapuram and actor Suresh Gopi in Thrissur.
Various exit polls had forecast happy tidings for the UDF.
Elaborate security arrangements are in place to ensure that the election results are declared in a trouble-free atmosphere. Security has been beefed up especially in north Kerala’s Vadakara constituency, where the LDF and UDF were locked in a tight fight. Restrictions under Section 144 are in place in the neighbourhood of the JDT Islam educational institutions where the votes for the Kozhikode and Vadakara constituencies are being counted.
Across counting centres, electronically-transmitted postal ballots and postal ballots are being counted first at the Returning Officers’ tables. Early Tuesday morning, strong rooms where the EVMs were kept were opened in the presence of the Returning Officer, Assistant Returning Officer, candidates or their election agents and Election Commission of India (ECI) observers.
Measures are in place for an error-free and secure counting process, Mr. kaul had said, after reviewing the arrangements on Monday.
The results are also available in real-time on the Election Commission of India’s (ECI) website and the Voter Helpline app.
