Elaborate arrangements to ensure peaceful counting process in J&K

Elaborate arrangements have been made by Election Commission officials in Jammu and Kashmir to ensure peaceful counting of votes for the six Lok Sabha seats in the state tomorrow.

Election officials said 10 counting centres have been set up for the counting process.

officials said a three-tier security ring would protect and secure each counting centre to ensure a free, fair and peaceful counting process.

Lok Sabha constituencies of Jammu, Udhampur, Anantnag, Srinagar and Baramulla would have one counting centre each while for the Ladakh Lok Sabha seat two counting centres are being set up, one in Leh and the other in Kargil town.

Three counting centres have been set up for counting of migrant votes in Delhi, Jammu and Udhampur.

Officials said there would 90 counting halls in total and 896 counting tables in these halls.

To ensure there is no untoward incident around the counting halls, prohibitory restrictions under section 144 CrPc will remain in force around each counting centre from the beginning till the end of the counting process, officials said.

General observers would monitor the counting process and they will be assisted by micro observers.

In the Jammu region, the contest is mainly between Jugal Kishore Sharma of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Raman Bhalla of the Congress. In Udhampur the main contest is between BJP candidate and Union Minister Jitendra Singh and Vikramaditya Singh of the Congress.

In the Valley, National Conference (NC) President and four-time Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah faces Aga Mohsin of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Irfan Raza Ansari of the Peoples Conference (PC) and Khalid Jahangir of the BJP.

In Baramulla Lok Sabha seat the main contest is between Muhammad Akbar Lone of the NC and Raja Aijaz Ali of the PC.

In Anantnag, the contest is three-cornered between former Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti of the PDP, G.A. Mir of the Congress and Justice (Retired) Hasnain Masoodi of the NC.

In the Ladakh constituency the main contest is between Rigzin Spalbar of the Congress and Jamyang Tsering Namgyal of the BJP. There are two powerful independent candidates also in the fray there - Haji Asgar Ali Karbalai and Sajjad Hussain.

All the six results from J&K are expected by tomorrow afternoon. IANS