Bhilai, Dec 11, 2018: The traditional anti-incumbency factor accompanied with complex political situation in the district played a major role in ensuring victory of five aspirants of Indian National Congress out of the six assembly constituencies in Durg District. Though the margin was low but the youngest Mayor Devendra Yadav succeeded in defeating BJP heavyweight Higher Education Minister Prem Prakash Pandey in Bhilai Nagar. Yadav scored 51044 votes as against his nearest rival Prem Prakash Pandey of Bharatiya Janata Party who scored 48195 votes. Devendra won this seat with a victory margin of 2849 votes. Till filing of this report, Congress candidates were leading in Patan, Ahiwara, Durg (Urban); and Durg (Rural). Vaishali Nagar proved to be the only face saving seat for Bharatiya Janata Party where its candidate Vidya Ratan Bhasin defeated INC Candidate Badruddin Qureshi by a margin 18080 votes. The only third-gender candidate from the district who contested as independent candidate from Durg (Urban) – Kanchan Shendre (Ind) secured 1698 votes.
On Tuesday, counting began amidst tight security at the premises of Shri Shankaracharya Engineering College, Junwani. The counting was started with the postal ballots which consumed about an hour. Thereafter the counting of votes in EVMs was initiated. Though the data from EVMs was extracted within a few minutes, the tabulation process consumed a lot of time and by evening results of only eight to ten rounds of counting could be declared. By the time of filing this report, final result of only two seats were available.
Police had made ‘Zero Error’ security arrangements on the principle of ‘Access Control’ at the vote counting centre. The cops made best possible efforts to ensure that the provisions of Section 144 were not violated in any condition.