Tripura: By-elections to two constituencies begin with slow polling

According to the report, only 15 percent of voting was recorded in the first two hours of the election, which election officials claimed was due to some last-minute technical problems. The voters have been in line since this morning.

However, no report of violence around the polling booths has yet been reported.

A total of 95,075 voters, including 45,124 females and 463 differently-abled voters, would exercise their franchise in 110 polling stations in both assembly constituencies. As many as nine candidates, comprising two each from the BJP and CPI-M and five independent candidates, are contesting the by-elections.

Besides state police, the Election Commission of India has deployed a large number of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) to hold the election peacefully. The BSF has intensified patrolling in the bordering areas to thwart infiltrations and unauthorised movements.

The opposition CPI-M alleged that the ruling BJP has brought a large number of outsiders into both poll-bound constituencies to disturb the polling process and alleged, "The BJP cadres have resorted to threats and intimidation to convince the opposition supporters not to go for voting. A senior CPM leader, Abu Jafar, was assaulted by a BJP candidate from Boxanagar, Tafajjal Hossain, and his followers on Monday night."

The party leaders urged the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) to take concrete measures to conduct the by-elections in a free, fair, and peaceful manner and to instruct the police to act without any leniency towards the evil attempts, and party state secretary Jitendra Chaudhury alleged that the unfair and violent means adopted by the BJP to reduce the election to a complete mockery.

He alleged BJP workers riding in two Bolero cars and defacing the numbers of vehicles with cloth or paint had terrorised the voters with firearms going house to house in Rangamura, Barkhola, Barmura, Bashpukur, and Nirbhoypur areas under the Dhanpur constituency for the last two days.

Meanwhile, BJP Tripura state president Rajib Bhattacharjee denied the allegation of the CPI-M and said, "The party built the imaginary stories just to find out a way to defend their humiliating defeat in both seats.

"People were fed up with leftists for 25 years, and they don’t want to see them again."

He asserted that BJP candidates would win both seats by a record margin.