Bangalore, April 24 (IANS) The prestigious Bangalore South constituency recorded the lowest voting of 44.73 percent in Karnataka where polling for 17 Lok Sabha seats was held Thursday, a top election official said Friday.
'Scrutiny of the register in the polling stations by the observers and the returning officer has shown 44.73 percent voting was recorded in Bangalore South as against 50 percent voting we received initially after polling ended at 5 p.m.,' state Chief Electoral Officer M.N. Vidyasankar told reporters here.
Bangalore South has 2.03 million registered voters. In the 2004 general elections, 49 percent of them had voted.
'The difference of 5.27 percent between the initial and final figures was due to discrepancies detected during the scrutiny undertaken earlier in the day,' Vidyasankar said.
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) general secretary and former central minister H.N. Ananth Kumar, in fray for the fifth consecutive time, is locked in a multi-cornered contest in Bangalore South against state Youth Congress president Krishna Byre Gowda, low-cost airline pioneer captain G.R. Gopinath as an independent, K.E. Radhakrishna of the Janatal Dal-Secular and 16 others.
Meanwhile, the state election commission has forwarded Byre Gowda's petition, alleging that about 30,000 names were missing or deleted from the voters' list in the constituency, to the returning officer to inquire with the electoral registrar office.
'We will take decision on Byre Gowda's petition after we get the inquiry report from the returning officer. We expect the report by Saturday,' Vidyasankar said.
Scrutiny of votes polled in the city's other two constituencies showed that the newly constituted Bangalore Central recorded 45.25 percent and Bangalore North 46.48 percent.
Similar scrutiny showed Chikkodi in north Karnataka recorded the highest percentage (67.81) of voting in the state Thursday, followed by Kolar 67.78 percent and Chickballapur 65.67 percent.
'The average voting percentage from the 17 constituencies is 54.6, with men polling 56.6 percent and women polling 52.61 percent.
Total electorate in all the 17 constituencies is 20.6 million.
Raichur (Scheduled Tribe) constituency in north Karnataka reported low voting of 45.91 percent.
Voter turnout in other constituencies: 54.95 in Belgaum, 47.28 in Bijapur, 49.21 in Gulbarga (Scheduled Caste), 53.09 in Bidar, 55.37 in Koppala, 61.44 in Bellary (ST), 59.23 in Uttar Kannada, 54.50 in Chitradurga (SC), 64.79 in Tumkur and 57.92 in Bangalore Rural.
In a related development, the Election Commission has ordered re-polling in three polling stations, including one in Bangalore North and two in Bangalore Rural, due to malfunctioning of electronic voting machines (EVMs).
'Re-polling will be held Saturday from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. in polling station 132 at Doddagallahatti in Yelahanka segment of Bangalore North, Ganganahalli polling station 19 in Magadi segment and Veeragoddanna doddi polling station 104 in Channpatna segment of Bangalore Rural,' the official noted.
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