Voting for Ramgarh Assembly bye-election 2023 ended peacefully on Monday with 67.96 per cent polling recorded by 5 PM on the day. Counting of votes will be done on March 2. Voters sealed the fate of 18 candidates in EVMs. All concrete arrangements were made by the Election Commission for free and fair polling. No untoward incident was reported during the polling.
Out of total 3,35,734 voters of the assembly constituency, 1,15,931 male voters and 1,12,221 female voters exercised their vote in the Ramgarh bye-election. After the end of polling till 5 PM, the total estimated polling percentage was 67.96 per cent, while total 69.19 per cent female voters exercised their votes as compared to 66.79 per cent male voters.
In the Ramgarh bye-election, work was also done by the commission for the awareness and cooperation of the voters in a total 405 polling stations. In the bye-election, the commission had arranged 405 volunteers, 51 wheelchairs and 79 vehicles for differently-abled voters. During the election process, the Election Commission kept a close watch on the compliance of the Model Code of Conduct. In this process, illicit liquor worth Rs 7,11,424.00 including Rs 46,22210.00 was seized.
A lot of enthusiasm was also seen among women for today's voting. In the bye-election, pink booths were set up to make women voters aware about exercising their franchise. Women security personnel were deployed to assist women at pink booths. Selfie zones and help desks were also made for them. Adequate security arrangements were made regarding the voting. Police forces were deployed at every booth.
Notably, 18 candidates are contesting the bypoll, in which major contest is between UPA nominee Bajrang Mahto, a Congress candidate, who also happens to be the husband of jailed former MLA Mamta Devi and NDA candidate Sunita Chaudhary, an AJSU Party candidate, who is wife of political heavyweight cum Lok Sabha MP from AJSU party CP Chaudhary.
Notably, former Ramgarh MLA from Congress party Mamta Devi had lost membership of Legislative Assembly after she was convicted and sentenced in a criminal case by a local court. Prior to Mamata, five members of the Jharkhand Legislative Assembly had lost their membership between 2015 and 2018 after their convictions in separate criminal cases. Mamta is the first woman legislator from the state, who has been convicted in a criminal case.
