All arrangements in place for Wednesday's Haryana polls

Chandigarh: All arrangements, including those of security, have been put in place for smooth conduct of polls to the 90-member Haryana Assembly on Wednesday.

"All the polling parties have left for their respective 16,357 polling booths along with Electronic Voting Machines and other related material," Chief Electoral Officer, Haryana, Shrikant Walgad said on Tuesday.

A total of 1,63,05,217 voters are eligible to cast their votes while a total of 1,351 candidates are in the fray. These voters include 87,37,116 males, 74,79,439 females and 88,662 service voters including 12 NRI voters, he said.

He said that mock poll would be organised in front of agents of candidates from 6 am to 7 am on Wednesday and after that polling would be held from 7 am to 6 pm

Only those voters as have entered the polling station up to 6 p.m. would be allowed to cast their vote, he said. Tight security arrangements had been put in place with deployment of nearly 50,000 forces including personnel of para-military forces, Home Guards along with the Haryana Police for peaceful conduct of elections.

Constant vigil was being maintained on persons and vehicles in all border areas of Haryana. Teams of flying squads were patrolling to ensure smooth conduct of elections, he said.

There are 30 Assembly constituencies where more than 15 candidates each are contesting and two EVMs each would be installed in these segments. One EVM each would be installed in the remaining 60 Assembly constituencies.

A maximum of 31 candidates are contesting in Bhiwani Assembly Constituency whereas a minimum of seven candidates each are in Shahbad and Nuh Assembly constituencies.

A maximum number of 3,16,567 voters are in Badshahpur Assembly Constituency whereas minimum number of 1,26,804 voters are in Narnaul Assembly Constituency.

Walgad said a total of 2,700 booths have been identified as sensitive. Video cameras and CCTV cameras have been installed, web-casting would be done and micro observers would be deputed at all polling booths for monitoring the election process.