65% turnout, posh areas fare badly

About 65% of voters on Sunday exercised their franchise in the first elections to the Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon (MCG). Sanjeev K Ahuja reports.

About 65% of voters on Sunday exercised their franchise in the first elections to the Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon (MCG).

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Like other elections, the turnout in posh areas of New Gurgaon remained as low as 20%. The total number of registered voters are 4,28,000.

Till the time of going to print, the electoral office did not declare the exact official percentage of votes cast.

The townships, the voters of which failed to turn up in good number, include DLF City, Sushant Lok, South City and many Huda sectors falling under ward No. 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34 and 35.

Various pressure groups such as ‘I Am Gurgaon’, ‘Cybercity Welfare Society’, ‘Just My Neighbour’ and ‘Saksham Gurgaon’ had launched campaigns to convince residents of new Gurgaon localities, but to no avail. Very low turnout was reported at most of the polling booths.

Although booths such as Scottish High School (ward No. 30) witnessed 666 voters out of 1,000 and Chakarpur 899 votes out of 1,200.

She said that RWAs with the help of the municipal corporation made a two-minute documentary which was shown before the beginning of every movie in all the city's multiplexes to spread awareness about the importance of voting.