Festival of Democracy in Odisha: Bigwigs and Officers Cast Their Votes in Sunny Morning

Bhubaneswar: Voting is going on smoothly for the third phase elections for the Lok Sabha and State Assembly in Odisha.

Long queues of voters were seen in the capital city Bhubaneswar where many bigwigs and important personalities cast their votes.

Chief Secretary Pradeep Kumar Jena and Additional Chief Secretary & Development Commissioner Anu Garg cast their votes at a polling booth in the capital city. Likewise, DGP Arun Kumar Sarangi also cast his vote and appealed all to come forward to vote.

Setting a stellar example of civic duty, Chief Electoral Officer Nikunja Bihari Dhal cast his vote alongside his family. Special Secretary, Finance Department Sujata Rout Karthikeyan exercised her franchise at a polling booth in Unit 6 Girls School.

Agriculture Secretary Arabinda Padhee, Transport Secretary Usha Padhee, SSEPD Principal Secretary Bishnupada Sethi, Khordha Collector Chanchal Rana, Panchayati Raj Dept Special Secretary Poonam T Guha, Additional Chief Secretary Satyabrata Sahu, Handloom Textiles & Handicrafts Department Joint Secretary Ananya Das, Twin City Police Commissioner Sanjeeb Panda, Transport Commissioner Amitabh Thakur and ADG Sanjiv Kumar also cast their votes and appealed all to cast their votes and participate in the biggest festival of democracy.

Rajya Sabha member Manas Mangaraj, Lok Sabha MP Achyuta Samanta, MLA Suresh Routray and BMC Mayor Sulochana Das also cast their votes.

Bhubaneswar MP candidate parajita Sarangi, Puri MP candidate Arup Patnaik, and MLA candidate Ashok Panda exercised their franchise.

Former MP Tathagata Satpathy, renowned sand artist Sudarshan Pattnaik, Ollywood actor Sabyasachi Mishra and several eminent personalities from different fields have also joined the festival of democracy and cast their votes.

The voting is underway in Sambalpur, Cuttack, Bhubaneswar, Keonjhar, Dhenkanal and Puri Lok Sabha seats and 42 Assembly constituencies under these segments.

As many as 94, 48,553 voters, including 48.30 lakh male, 46.18 lakh female voters are likely to exercise their franchise in the simultaneous elections in the State. They will decide the fate of 64 candidates in the Lok Sabha seats and 383 in the Assembly seats.