Chennai: The ruling DMK-led Secular Progressive Alliance in Tamilnadu has established clear leads in a majority of the wards and is all set to sweep the urban local bodies, as the counting of votes polled in the 19 February ordinary elections began amid tight security today.
The counting of votes began at 8 ams in 268 counting centres across the State. As per the early trends, the DMK-led Front, which had won the May 2021 Assemby polls with a comfortable majority and returned to power after a gap of ten years in the company of Congress, MDMK, VCK, CPI, CPI(M), TVK, MMK and other minor parties, is all set to repeat the success story as their nominees were leading in a majority of the wards in Corporations, Municipalities and Town Panchayats, pushing the principal opposition AIADMK to a distant second. The BJP and the AMMK made their presence felt by winning some seats.
As the trends started coming in, senior leaders and Ministers called on Chief Minister M K Stalin and congratulated him. DMK members resorted to celebrations across Tamilnadu.
All the counting centres have been brought under a three-tier security blanket with the deployment of armed police personnel and round the clock monitoring through CCTV cameras.
The polling, held after over a decade to elect more than 12,500 ward members to 648 urban local bodies, passed off peacefully on Saturday.
A total of 60.70 percent of the total 2.79 crore electorate have cast their ballots with Chennai recording the lowest turnout of 43.59 per cent polling. While Town Panchayats recorded 74.68 per cent turnout, it was 68.22 per cent in Municipalities and 52.22 per cent in Corporations.
The fate of 57,778 candidates, who had contested the elections for 648 urban local bodies in 21 Municipal Corporations, 138 Municipalities and 489 Town Panchayats in the State would be known today after counting.
Polling was held to fill up 12,607 posts, which included 1,374 Corporation Ward members, 3,843 Municipality Ward and 7,621 Town Panchayat member posts.
A total 218 candidates were declared elected unopposed in various parts of the State. After the newly elected members assume office on 2 March, indirect elections for the Mayors and Deputy Mayors of the Corporations, the Chairpersons and Vice-chairpersons of the Municipalities and the Presidents and Vice-Presidents of the Town Panchayats will be held on March four.
The elections witnessed a multi-cornered contest with the main contest being between the ruling DMK and the principal Opposition AIADMK.