Tripura East headed to polls tomorrow amid heavy security

Agartala, April 22, 2019:

The Election Commission has taken unprecedented measures to ensure the safe passage of elections in Tripura East Lok Sabha Constituency where the voting was deferred over security concerns.

Over 5,300 central para-military forces and 4,000 Tripura State Rifles (TSR) troopers are being deployed to conduct free, fair and smooth voting in the Tripura East seat.

The central forces would be deployed at most of the 1,645 polling booths in 1,349 locations, spread across six districts, for the election on 23 April. Ten contenders are in the fray from the second Constituency in Tripura (the other being Tripura East).

Citing "non-conducive security situation", following reports by the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Sriram Taranikanti, Special Central Police Observer Mrinal Kanti Das (former Manipur DGP), the Returning Officer and other intelligence inputs, the poll panel early last week had deferred voting to the seat from April 18 to April 23,

1,257,944 voters that include 620,291 women will head to the polls in the Tripura East Lok Sabha Constituency.

This time, there will be multi-cornered contest for the Tripura polls with the BJP, Congress, IPFT and CPI (M) parties considered heavy contenders.