Punjab Elections 2017: Complaints about 150 EVMs not working properly were received.
Voting at many polling stations in Punjab was disrupted or delayed for as much as an hour on Saturday due to technical snags hitting Electronic Voting Machines or EVMs. Complaints about almost 150 EVMs not functioning properly in various assembly constituencies were received by the state election officer in Chandigarh.
Sources told NDTV that voting was paused in some polling booths in the Majitha constituency and the Election Commission was asked whether the EVMs could be replaced.
Reports of a large number of machines not able to function due to technical snag came in from Amritsar, Muktsar and Sangrur district. Due to the problem, polling had to be called off a number of times, Punjab Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) VK Singh said, adding these machines were replaced by others.
The VVPAT (voter verified paper audit trail) machines also developed snags in various assembly segments.
The VVPAT machine issues a slip to the voter to make sure his vote has gone to the candidate whom he voted for by pressing the key opposite the contender's name on the EVM.
The Election Department is using 31,460 EVMs in the one-day assembly elections for 117 seats in Punjab. There are 22,614 polling stations in the state.
Among those who came out early to vote today were Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, his son and Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal, daughter-in-law and union minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal, who voted in Badal village which falls in Lambi constituency. Aam Aadmi Party's Bhagwant Mann was seen flashing a big smile when he voted in Mohali, meanwhile, Captain Amarinder Singh was seen at a polling station in Patiala, which had a red carpet laid out.
All the key players in the state - Akali Dal-BJP combine, Congress and AAP - seemed confident of victory.
Over 50 per cent of Punjab's 1.98 crore voters had cast their votes till 3 pm, election officials said.
With inputs from IANS