Counting of votes for Arunachal Pradesh Assembly elections to begin at 6 am on June 2

ITANAGAR: Counting of votes for the Arunachal Pradesh Assembly elections will begin at 6 am on June 2, an official said here on Wednesday.

Assembly and Lok Sabha elections were held simultaneously in Arunachal Pradesh on April 19.

"Over 2000 officials will be deployed for counting of votes on both the days - (June 2 Assembly election and June 4 Lok Sabha)," the official said.

Counting of votes for assembly elections will start from 6 am on June 2 while that for Lok Sabha polls would start from 8 am on June 4, Chief Electoral Officer Pawan Kumar Sain said.

"This time we have decided to conduct counting for all constituencies in a district simultaneously and will try to announce the results by noon," Sain said, adding that media centres would be set up in all counting centres to disseminate information on counting updates.

Counting of votes for 50 assembly seats out of a total of 60, will be held in 24 centres in the state on June 2 while that for Lok Sabha seats would be conducted in 25 centres on June 4, Joint Chief Electoral Officer Liken Koyu said.

The ruling BJP has already won 10 seats in the 60-member assembly unopposed.

The second round of training for officials for counting of votes ended on Tuesday, an official said.

"A three-tier security barricade have been made in all the counting centres comprising personnel of central paramilitary forces, state armed police and state civil police, available in the state," the CEO said.

"I had already convened a coordination meeting with all the district electoral officers (DEOs) and superintendents of police (SPs) to review the law and order situation along with chief secretary and director general of police, where the DGP directed all SPs to ensure peaceful counting process," Sain said.

The CEO said that the DEOs have been instructed to ensure that counting agents of various political parties enter the counting centres without cell phones.

A total of 133 candidates contested in the assembly seats while 14 in the two Lok Sabha seats.

In the Arunachal West Parliamentary seat, eight candidates including Union Earth Sciences Minister Kiren Rijiju and state Congress president Nabam Tuki contested the elections.

Sitting BJP MP Tapir Gao and state Congress vice-president Bosiram Siram are among the six candidates who contested from Arunachal East Lok Sabha seat.

The BJP had won both the Lok Sabha seats in the 2019 elections while in the assembly the party had bagged 41 seats. The JD (U) had won seven seats, NPP in five, Congress in four while the PPA had secured one seat and Independent candidates got two.