Ranchi, Dec 14 (IANS): About a third of voters had cast their votes till 11.00 a.m. in the fourth phase of the Jharkhand state assembly elections, an Election Commission official said Sunday.

"Till 11.00 a.m., 30.06 percent voting has taken place. Till 11.00 a.m. the highest turnout was in Sindri with 40 percent, followed by Tundi with 39 percent," the official added.

Earlier, balloting for 15 of the total 81 seats of the Jharkhand state assembly began Sunday at 7 a.m.

The polling is taking place at 5,482 booths, including 36 auxiliary polling booths. Among these, 716 polling booths have been declared very sensitive and 2,007 have been declared sensitive.

The Election Commission has declared 183 polling stations as model polling stations. Web casting facility is available at 335 polling stations and approximately 27,410 polling personnel are deployed for poll duties during this phase.

In this phase, a total of 43,48,709 voters, including 20,03,516 female voters, will decide the fate of 217 candidates, 16 of them are women candidates.

"Balloting for 13 of the 15 seats will take place from 0700 hours to 1500 hours. However, for the two seats in Dhanbad and Bokaro, voting would continue till 1700 hours," an Election Commission official said.

Among the key candidates whose fate will be decided in this fourth phase is former chief minister Babulal Marandi, contesting from Giridih seat. Ministers Mannan Mallik of the Congress, Haji Hussain Ansari of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, and Suresh Paswan of the Rashtriya Janata Dal are among other prominent candidates in this phase of elections.