COUNTING of votes will be held on Monday in Tamil Nadu, Assam, Keralam, Puducherry and West Bengal after a riveting high-voltage contest with the outcome crucial for prominent ruling regional parties like the TMC and DMK as well as the BJP, Congress and the Left. The exercise will begin at 8 am, starting with the postal ballots, at the counting centres, which will have a three-tier security system. In a first, the Election Commission has introduced a QR code-based Photo Identity Card system through ECINET to prevent unauthorised entry into counting centres. Votes will be counted across 77 centres for 293 Assembly seats in West Bengal, which has witnessed unprecedented security deployment this time and an acrimony-filled run-up to the result day, with both the ruling TMC and opposition BJP expressing apprehensions of vote manipulation. The two-phase polls in the state ended on April 29, with its highest-ever voter turnout of 92.47 per cent since Independence. The election was countermanded in one constituency - Falta - in South 24 Parganas district due to “severe electoral offences” and fresh polls will be held there on May 21.

 

The BJP-led NDA is hoping for a hat-trick in Assam. EVMs, holding the electoral fates of 722 hopefuls from 126 Assembly constituencies of the state, will be opened at 40 counting centres across 35 districts. In Keralam, buoyed by its performance in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls and recent local body elections, the Congress-led UDF is hoping to oust the Left Democratic Front (LDF), which has been in power for two terms, while the BJP-led NDA is attempting to gain a foothold in the State with a bipolar polity. The ruling DMK in Tamil Nadu is hoping for a second consecutive term after contesting in a changed political arena as, apart from its main rival AIADMK, there were new entrants like actor-politician Vijay-led TVK’s and Tamil nationalist Seeman’s NTK. In Puducherry, six counting centres have been set up across the Union Territory. Ruckus outside counting centre in Mamata’s constituency: THE counting centre at West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s Bhabanipur Assembly constituency witnessed ruckus a day ahead of the counting of votes, with TMC workers alleging two cars bearing the BJP’s flag were allowed entry to the compound where EVMs are kept.