High-voter turnout shows anti-Congress wave
Picture for representational purpose only. File photo - PTI.
New Delhi: The high voter turnout in the third phase of the polls on Thursday could be an indicator of anti-incumbency against the Congress-led UPA-2 government. With corruption and price-rise seeming to top the list of issues on the minds of the electorate in 91 parliamentary seats across 11 states and three Union Territories that went to the polls on Thursday, the voting trend was being viewed as a strong anti-Congress feeling rather than a Modi wave.
With all seven seats in the national capital going to the polls in this phase, a massive voter turnout touching the 1984 level (64.5 per cent), which saw a wave-like situation in favour of Rajiv Gandhi, has given an indication of the kind of anger against the establishment.
Election Commission officials, however, claimed that this figure could rise further due to the recent massive turn-out in the previous Assembly elections in December last year. Whenever the voting percentage had touched 64 per cent in previous elections in Delhi, the results were one-sided. The highest-ever voting in Delhi — 71.3 per cent — took place after the Emergency.
The nearly 68 per cent turnout in riot-hit Muzaffarnagar, and higher in Shamli, and 73.43 per cent in Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh, were also clear signs of massive polarisation along communal lines in this crucial region. With polling passing off peacefully in all the 10 seats of western UP, the average turnout was 65 per cent.
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