Polling for the urban local body elections in Uttarakhand was held peacefully barring a few reported incidents of minor disturbances on Sunday.

A number of voters in various areas also complained of their names missing from the voters list. Despite this, the final overall voting percentage in the state is expected to be around 65 per cent.

The State election commissioner  Chandrashekhar Bhatt informed The Pioneer that the polling for the local body elections had gone off peacefully across the state. He said, “As per the regulation, those who entered the polling centre before 5 PM were allowed to cast their votes. Due to this it is taking longer in some places for the polling to end. We cannot release the final polling percentage till we get the final figures from all the districts.

However, the polling percentage in the local body elections of 2008 was 62 per cent and in 2013 it was 65.56 per cent. Considering this and the fact that about 60 per cent polling was registered in the state on Sunday till 4 PM, we expect the polling percentage to reach about 65 per cent,” he said.

According to the figures provided by the State Election Commission, as on 4 PM, the polling percentage registered in the districts was 49.38 per cent in Almora, 67.82 per cent in Udham Singh Nagar, 61.5 per cent in Champawat, 55.57 per cent in Nainital, 53.99 per cent in Pithoragarh, 60.98 per cent in Bageshwar, 55.54 per cent in Uttarkashi, 55 per cent in Chamoli, 58.86 per cent in Tehri, 56.79 per cent Dehradun, 55.6 per cent in Pauri, 63.58 per cent in Rudraprayag and 65.03 in Haridwar. The total polling percentage of the state at 4 PM was 59.97 per cent.

It is pertinent to mention here that polling for the local body elections began at 8 AM with queues of voters forming in various locations since the morning.

The polling percentage in the state which was 12.86 per cent till 10 AM, rose to 30.78 by 12 PM and 44.33 by 2 PM. There were a total of 2353833 voters in the elections to 84 local bodies across the 13 districts of the state.

The polling percentage had increased to 59.97 per cent by 4 PM with 1411569 voters having exercised their franchise by then. According to officials, till the time of this report being filed, the polling percentage had not been received from some of the districts. The final figure for the state was expected to be received late in the night.