Rafique Aziz
Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar: Here is good news: The efforts of the district election office and the candidates from the nine constituencies have yielded results and helped bring down the NOTA (None Of The Above) figures by 5,928 compared to the 2019 Legislative Assembly election.
This year, the votes were counted on November 23. There were 183 candidates in the fray from the nine constituencies. The results revealed that 11,348 citizens in the district preferred to press NOTA (None Of The Above) when, according to them, no candidate was suitable in their respective constituencies.
The figures of NOTA recorded in nine constituencies include Sillod - 725; Kannad - 1093; Phulambri - 936; Central - 938; West - 1703; East - 1289; Paithan - 1475;
Gangapur - 1466 and Vaijapur - 1723. The total of these votes was 11,348.
Earlier, in 2019, NOTA votes counted in the nine constituencies include Sillod - 2844; Kannad - 2167; Phulambri - 1301; Aurangabad Central - 1365; Aurangabad West - 3187; Aurangabad East - 1953; Paithan - 1998; Gangapur - 1491 and Vaijapur - 970. The total NOTA votes were 17,276.
It may be noted that the district election officer and district collector Deelip Swami, deputy DEO Devendra Katke and other election officials left no stone unturned to record maximum voter turnout, create awareness about voting, etc. On the other hand, nearly all the candidates also deployed their staff to make aware the citizens of the operation of EVMs; how to vote; etc.
“The drop in NOTA figures compared to the 2019 Legislative Assembly election indicates that the efforts put in by the election administration and the candidates helped in curbing the figure. Their efforts helped people to change their minds to an extent. It may be noted that NOTA is pressed by the citizens when they think that not a single candidate in their respective constituency is suitable for them. We cannot tell that this button was pressed by mistake. However, the results indicate that the figure may further drop in future,” said a political expert on anonymity.