Itanagar: Campaigning for the municipal and panchayat elections in Arunachal Pradesh concluded on Saturday, paving the way for polling scheduled on December 15.
Voting will be held for the Itanagar Municipal Corporation (IMC), Pasighat Municipal Council (PMC) and various panchayat bodies across the state.
Polling will take place from 7 am to 4 pm on Monday, State Election Commissioner Rinchin Tashi said, adding that electioneering ended at 4 pm on Saturday.
In an order issued ahead of polling, the State Election Commission prohibited all public meetings and election-related gatherings for the next 48 hours as part of the mandatory silence period.
The election process has already seen a large number of candidates declared elected unopposed.
According to the SEC, 63 candidates have secured victory without contest in municipal and rural polls.
The BJP has won 58 zilla parishad seats unopposed, while one such seat went to a candidate from the National People’s Party. In addition, 5,037 BJP candidates for gram panchayat member posts have been declared elected uncontested.
In the urban local body elections, four BJP candidates have also been elected unopposed to the Itanagar Municipal Corporation.
For the remaining seats, electoral contests will be held in 186 zilla parishad constituencies with 440 candidates in the fray.
A total of 39 candidates are contesting in 16 wards of the IMC, while 21 candidates are vying for eight wards of the PMC.
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The SEC said that 13 gram panchayat constituencies received no nominations, while nominations in 14 other gram panchayat constituencies were rejected during scrutiny.
Polling in the Dumba Singpho gram panchayat constituency has been countermanded following the death of a validly nominated candidate.
Altogether, 8,31,648 voters are eligible to cast their votes in the elections, including 7,59,210 voters in rural polls and 72,438 in civic elections.
Polling will be conducted across 2,171 stations for panchayat elections, 67 for IMC and 12 for PMC.
Electronic Voting Machines will be used for the municipal polls, while ballot boxes will be deployed for the panchayat elections. Counting of votes is scheduled to take place on December 20.
