Despite all attempts to sensitise voters to exercise their franchises in large numbers, of all the areas, the State capital city recorded the poorest turnout of 40 per cent.
The city had recorded a higher voters’ turnout at 48 per cent in the 2009 twin elections. It had also been noticed that the capital city witnessed a low voters’ turnout of less than 50 per cent in the elections to the Urban local Body (UlB), Assembly and lok Sabha.
Keeping this in view, the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) had undertaken several awareness drives to make voters aware about their voting rights so that the turnout would increase, but it could not motivate the educated voters of the city to come out of their houses. The BMC had organised an awareness drive called ‘Runs for Democracy’ and also set up 60 model polling stations to attract voters to the booths, but nothing helped improve the city’s poor record.
Capital records lowest turnout of 40 per cent
According to sources, many voters were not happy with change of polling booths and problems regarding voters’ list. In the Chandrasekharpur area, several people returned from the polling booths without casting their votes due to changes of booths.