Kohima (TIP)- Polling personnel in six eastern districts of Nagaland waited for nine hours in booths, but not one of the four lakh voters of the region turned up following a shutdown call given by an organisation to press for its demand for “Frontier Nagaland Territory” (FNT).
CM Neiphiu Rio on Friday, April 19, affirmed that the state government did not have any problem with the Eastern Nagaland People’s Organisation’s (ENPO) demand for FNT as it has already recommended autonomous powers for the region. The ENPO is the apex body of the seven tribal organisations of the eastern region. Officials said there was no movement of people or vehicles on major streets in eastern Nagaland except those of the administrations and emergency services.
Additional Chief Electoral Officer of Nagaland Awa Loring said polling personnel were present between 7 am and 4 pm in the 738 polling stations in the region which comprises 20 Assembly segments.
Sources in the CEO’s office said none came up to cast votes in those nine hours. Those 20 MLAs also did not exercise their franchise.
Of the 13.25 lakh voters in Nagaland, the six districts in Eastern Nagaland have 4,00,632 voters. Speaking to reporters after casting his vote at his village in Touphema, some 41 km on the outskirts of the state capital, the chief minister said he accepted the draft working paper for FNT which was handed over to him in the presence of Home Minister Amit Shah. “Everything looks okay except the power-sharing the elected legislators of the region and members of the proposed FNT,” he said. The CM said the state had already recommended an autonomous body so that the region got sufficient packages.
Source: PTI
Tag: Nagaland
-
4 lakh voters in 6 Nagaland districts, but none turns up amid shutdown call
-
BJP and allies retain power in Tripura, Nagaland; hung verdict in Meghalaya
New Delhi (TIP)- The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its allies retained power in Tripura and Nagaland, while in Meghalaya, the National People’s Party (NPP) emerged as the single largest party. The results show that voters in these northeastern States largely rejected calls for a change. The polls in each of the three States were seen as a litmus test for the BJP with the 2024 Lok Sabha election just a year away.
The BJP and its regional ally, the Indigenous People’s Front of Tripura, won 33 seats — 11 fewer than in 2018 but two more than the majority mark. The TIPRA Motha, which banked primarily on the ‘Tiprasa’ (tribal) people who dominate 20 of the 60 Assembly seats, lived up to the expectations by winning 13 of the 42 seats it contested.
The outcome was a setback for the Left Front, which saw its seat count dip to 11 from 16 five years ago. But the Congress gained from a seat-sharing agreement with the Left Front, winning three of the 13 seats it contested. The grand old party drew a blank in 2018. Tripura Chief Minister Manik Saha attributed the party’s victory to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah and BJP national president J.P. Nadda’s leadership besides the legwork of its grassroots workers.
“We shall continue with the good work initiated in 2018 and take Tripura forward,” he said.
State BJP leaders said the victory underlined Mr. Saha’s role as the saviour of the party’s image after his predecessor Biplab Kumar Deb, who often courted controversies. Mr. Saha, a soft-spoken dental surgeon, replaced Mr. Deb as the Chief Minister nine months ahead of the elections.
Pradyot Bikram Manikya Debbarma, the chairman of Tipra Motha, said his party did well to emerge as the second largest within two years of its birth. “One has to acknowledge the discontent among the tribal people in Tripura,” he said. One of the factors that helped the BJP win is believed to be the consolidation of the non-tribal voters wary of the Greater Tipraland demand of the Tipra Motha. Non-tribals dominate 40 seats in the State.
The BJP and its dominant regional ally, the Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (NDPP), had it fairly easy in Nagaland, a State virtually without any Opposition for a long time.
While the BJP maintained its 2018 seat count with 12 seats in the 60-member Assembly, the NDPP increased its tally to 25 from 17 in five years. Six other parties and Independents bagged the remaining 23 seats.
The other parties include the Republican Party of India (Athawale) and the Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas), which won two seats each. These parties are associated with the BJP at the national level.
The Congress, once a formidable force, failed to open its account for the second successive time, while the Naga People’s Front managed only two seats, 24 fewer than in 2018.
Mandate 2023 in Nagaland proved to be historic with two women — NDPP’s Hekani Jakhalu and Salhoutuonuo Kruse — becoming the first to be elected to the State Assembly.
“The people have reposed their faith in us once again. Our responsibility to address some key issues has increased,” Nagaland Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio.
Source: The Hindu
-
Tripura election: 81% voter turnout recorded, EC says polls ‘largely violence-free’
New Delhi (TIP)- The tentative voter turnout for the 60-member Tripura Assembly today was recorded at 81% with the final figures to be known only by Friday, February 17, the Election Commission of India (ECI) said.
The polling passed off “largely violence-free”, the commission said, adding that eligible Bru migrant voters, displaced from Mizoram 26 years ago due to ethnic trouble, were able to exercise their franchise for the first time in the state. Poll panel officials said no major complaints had been received so far by the ECI. “There have been no reports of any major violence or attack on candidates or (polling) agents or intimidation of voters. As against 168 repolls in the state in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, today’s poll for 60 Assembly seats in Tripura has been largely peaceful with no (demand for) repoll reported so far,” the poll panel said in a statement.
“Minor instances” of violence which were reported were promptly looked into by local officials,” the panel added. “For the first time in many years, Bru migrant voters were able to exercise their franchise. Special efforts were made to enrol them. Some 14,055 eligible Brus were enrolled in the state in 12 locations. They cast their votes at these locations spread across four districts,” it said. Meanwhile, the ECI said it had seized drugs, cash, and freebies worth over Rs 147 crore in Tripura, Nagaland and Meghalaya.
According to officials, the seized items included Rs 14 crore in cash, foreign liquor valued at over Rs 9 crore and drugs worth Rs 85.76 crore. The highest seizures were made in Meghalaya at over Rs 63 crore, followed by Tripura (Rs 44.67 crore) and Nagaland (Rs 39.19 crore). Nagaland and Meghalaya will go to the polls on February 27.
The poll panel said the seizures in the three states marked a significant increase as compared to 2018 polls.
For more than 30 years, Tripura was ruled by the CPM till the upset in 2018, when the BJP won 36 of the 60 seats in a state where it practically had no presence. Though the score pushed the BJP well above the majority mark of 31, it still formed alliance with regional IPFT (Indigenous Progressive Front of Tripura) – which got eight seats — as insurance against any defection by its MLAs.
The CPM, which ruled Tripura for 35 years, has joined forces with the Congress this time, and its campaign is being led by its four-time Chief Minister Manik Sarkar. The Left Front will contest 47 of the state’s 60 seats, leaving just 13 seats for the Congress.
While the CPM won 16 seats in 2018, the Congress – main opposition in the previous assembly — drew a blank. The CPM is hoping that their alliance will help add votes in around 13 seats. But the alliance has raised eyebrows among the Kerala units of both parties where they have been sworn enemies for decades.
The Tipra Motha – the new party formed by former royal Pradyot Kishore Debbarma with a core demand of Greater Tipraland — might queer the pitch for the BJP. While the BJP has the local party IPFT in its corner, its hold on some seats have loosened over the last five years. In 2021, IPFT was wiped out in the Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council polls and had to accept only five seats to contest in this election.
The BJP had initially attempted to build a rapport with the Tipra Motha, but its overtures were met with rebuff. After the BJP declared that it would not allow any division of Tripura, the Tipra Motha also hardened its stand, flinging Union minister Amit Shah’s allegation of its being the “B Team of CPM-Congress” back at the BJP.
Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, the BJP’s pointsperson in the northeast, has predicted a hugely improved performance by the party in all three northeastern states that are going to polls in this round. Elections are due in Meghalaya and Nagaland on February 27. Counting of votes will be held on March 2.