Agartala, Aug 8 (IANS): The voting for the three-tier Gram Panchayats in Tripura was underway with around 50 per cent polling recorded so far, said officials here

The Tripura State Election Commission (SEC) officials said that 50 per cent of around 13 lakh electorate had exercised their franchise. There is no major incident of violence, except for a few minor ones and the voting was by and large peaceful in all the eight districts of the state, an SEC official said.

A police official said that some incidents of intimidation, attacks on polling agents and wrongdoings were reported from Sepahijala, Gomati and South Tripura districts and the police immediately intervened in these incidents.

State Election Commissioner (SEC) Saradindu Chaudhuri said that to hold the elections peacefully, over 10,000 state security forces, including Tripura State Rifles (TSR) personnel and around 2,200 Central Armed Police Force (CAPF) personnel have been deployed.

Amidst opposition parties’ allegations of pre-poll violence, intimidation and attacks, the ruling BJP candidates have already emerged victorious without any contest in over 4,551 (71.44 per cent) of the 6,370-Gram Panchayat seats, in 235 (55.55 per cent) of the 423 Panchayat Samiti seats and 20 (17 per cent) of the 116 Zilla Parishad seats.

According to the SEC officials, elections are being held on Thursday in 1,819 seats of the 606-gram panchayats, 188 seats in 35 Panchayat Samitis and 96 seats in eight Zilla Parishads.

In all 4,761 candidates of different political parties are contesting in the 3-tier Gram Panchayats in eight districts, excluding areas under the Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TTAADC).

There are 6,370 seats in 606 Gram Panchayats, 423 seats in 35 Panchayat Samitis, and 116 seats in eight Zilla Parishads, with 33 per cent reservation for women.

The votes will be counted on August 12.

The Tripura High Court on July 18 directed the SEC to conduct free and fair three-tier Gram Panchayats elections.

A division bench of the High Court comprising Justice Arindam Lodh and Justice Sabyasachi Datta Purkayastha had asked the SEC to hold the panchayat elections freely, fairly and transparently.

The High Court passed the orders after the opposition Congress and the CPI(M) earlier filed separate petitions before the court seeking its directions to the SEC to conduct the Gram Panchayats elections freely and fairly after a large number of violent incidents took place across the state while the candidates of the opposition parties tried to submit their nomination papers.