Seventeen percent of the voters exercised their franchise in the first three hours of polling on Friday to elect sarpanches and panches of gram panchayats in four districts of Haryana in the final phase of panchayat polls, officials said.
Polling began at 7 am and will continue till 6 pm in the four districts of Faridabad, Fatehabad, Hisar and Palwal. Voting is being held to elect 929 sarpanches and 10,362 panches in 25 blocks of the four districts.
State Election Commissioner Dhanpat Singh said foolproof security measures have been put in place to ensure smooth and peaceful polling. He said additional police force has been deployed in sensitive and hypersensitive polling booths.
Arrangements had been made well in advance so that Persons With Disabilities do not face any inconvenience at all the polling booths, he further said. Singh said that over 22 lakh voters are eligible to cast their vote in these four districts.
There are a total of 2,655 polling stations in these four districts, out of which 615 are sensitive and 781 are hypersensitive. After the completion of polling of all three phases of Panchayati Raj Institutions in the state, the results of the zilla parishad and panchayat samiti members will be declared on November 27.
(With PTI inputs)
