CANACONA
According to reliable sources, the incident occurred at the Parvem polling station for elections to Ward 3 (Mirandawada-Mudcheli) which is reserved for ST Women of Agonda.
“At the end of polling day, the presiding officer of Ward 3, while sealing of ballot boxes in the presence of candidates and their polling agents, informed them that even though 326 votes had been polled, 327 voting slips were issued and sealed in ballot boxes,” a source revealed.
“This is because a woman was issued a second ballot paper after she botched up the first one due to a wrong voting procedure. The woman had applied her thumb impression on the candidate’s symbol instead of using the rubber stamp which was given to her, thereby failing to vote properly,” the source said.
Asked how the incident was first noticed in the polling booth, the source explained: “It was revealed that an alert polling official noticed the woman with an ink mark on one of her thumbs and enquired with her. The woman explained that she is illiterate and had rubbed the stamp, which had wet ink, on to her thumb and then placed her thumb impression on the symbol to vote.”
“A second ballot paper was then issued to her and this time, woman used the rubber stamp on the ballot paper. It was, however, not known if she had stamped correctly or not, as her second ballot was folded and inserted in the box,” the source added.
Meanwhile, 21,352 voters exercised their franchise in the elections to 53 seats across seven village Panchayats of Canacona on Sunday. Four candidates are already elected unopposed. Elections took place peacefully in all polling stations of Canacona taluka.
While Poinguinim panchayat witnessed 4,001 voters taking part in the polls, only 1,895 voters exercised their franchise in elections to the Cotigao panchayat.
