NEW DELHI, Oct 11: The Election Commission of India in response to the appeal by several political parties and others has decided to defer the polling to the Rajasthan state Assembly by two days to November 25.
The ECI on Wednesday announced that it had received representations from various political parties, including Jodhpur BJP MP PP Chaudhary, social organisations, and several media platforms to change the date of the poll because November 23, the date for the polling announced on Tuesday was “Dev Uthi Ekadashi” when a large number of weddings and other social engagements were held in Rajasthan.
The poll body said it had decided to defer the polling to November 25 considering that wedding rush may cause inconvenience to a large number of people, causing various logistical issues and leading to reduced voter participation in the poll. The Commission, having considered these factors and representations, decided to change the date of polls from November 23 to November 25, the ECI said in a statement.
Polling in the four other states schedules for which were announced along with Rajasthan on Tuesday would remain unchanged from November 7 to 30 and the counting of votes in all the five states including Rajasthan would be taken as per schedule on December 3, it said.
(Manas Dasgupta)
