Chennai: With the counting of votes polled in the Nanguneri and Vikravandi by-elections to be held tomorrow, three-tier protection has been given to the counting centres.
Voters flocked the polling booths Monday to exercise their democratic duty following which Vikravandi registered 84.36 per cent votes and in Nanguneri it was 66.35 per cent.
The result of the election will be closely watched tomorrow as the exit polls have predicted victory for the ruling AIADMK in both the constituencies.
AIADMK’s M R Muthamizhselvan and Reddiyarpatti V Narayanan are in the fray in Vikravandi and Nanguneri segments respectively.
DMK’s N Pugazhendhi is contesting from Vikravandi constituency and its ally Congress party’s nominee ”Ruby” Manoharan is testing his luck from Nanguneri.
All the 574 polling stations in Vikravandi (275) and Nanguneri (299) were covered by live web streaming. In Vikravandi, 18 polling stations were ”critical”, and 32 ”vulnerable”.
As far as Nanguneri is concerned, there were no critical polling booths and but 110 stations were declared vulnerable. While Vikravandi has an electorate of 2.57 lakh voters, Nanguneri has 2.23 lakh voters.
Over 3,000 personnel were on duty on the polling day.
Apart from the by-polls in Tamilnadu, counting will also be held for the Puducherry’s Kamaraj Nagar constituency. Congress party’s A John Kumar and the Opposition AINRC nominee S Bhuvaneswarane are locked in a direct fight.
The Vikravandi Assembly seat fell vacant after DMK MLA K Rathamani passed away in June. Nanguneri is vacant after Congress MLA H Vasantha Kumar resigned in May after being elected as Member of Parliament.