KARWAR: In
Uttara Kannada, which created history on Saturday with an all-time high 78% voting percentage, the polling booth inside
INS Kadamba naval base created another sort of record: of the lowest polling percentage in the assembly election. Of 661 voters in booth number 139 inside the naval base, only two people cast their vote, which is just 0.32%.
The polling booth in the naval base was first set up during the
Lok Sabha election in 2014 on the request of the naval authorities. According to
Election Commission sources, in all, 661 voters were enrolled here. A separate booth was opened and more than seven staff had been deployed here, but to the surprise of the officials, only two people trooped in!
District administration officials said it was very difficult to manage the booth and enrol the voters as prior permission of the naval authorities had to be taken to enter Kadamba. Sometimes, EC officials had to wait for more than three hours outside the main gate of the naval base, as a matter of security. Despite all these efforts, the result was an apathetic 0.32%, officials said.
But some naval officials said that they were not aware of any booth inside the naval base. While state government and central government departments had declared a holiday to help their employees vote, the Navy had not done so, and neither did the voters get slips from the district administration, they said.
File Image.