Around 8.30 per cent of 1.38 crore voters exercised their franchise in the first two hours of polling in eight Lok Sabha seats of Bihar in the sixth phase on Sunday, election officials said.

Polling is underway peacefully in Valmikinagar, West Champaran, East Champaran, Sheohar, Vaishali, Gopalganj, Siwan and Maharajganj with a few incidents of malfunctioning of Electronic Voting Machines, the officials said.

Siwan recorded the highest voter turnout at 13 per cent followed by 10.50 per cent in Gopalganj, 9.06 per cent in Sheohar, 9.00 per cent in Vaishali, 8.90 per cent in Valmikinagar, 8.70 per cent in West Champaran, 5.60 per cent in Maharajganj and 4.98 per cent in East Champaran, they said.

“Polling has been peaceful with no untoward incidents reported from any of these constituencies so far except initial reports of EVM malfunctioning from few places. Voting began after rectifying the technical problems,” an official said.

He said the polling began late - between 30 minutes and 90 minutes - in certain polling stations due to technical problems in EVMs which were rectified.

A polling officer was injured at a polling station in Sheohar constituency when a homeguard accidently fired from his rifle while he was cleaning his gun before the start of polls in the morning, Sheohar Sub-Divisional Police Officer Rakesh Kumar said.

The injured polling officer was admitted to hospital.

Prominent candidates whose electoral fate will be decided on Sunday’s polling included Union minister Radha Mohan Singh (East Champaran), senior RJD leader Raghuvansh Prasad Singh (Vaishali), RJD’s Heena Shahab (Siwan) who is the wife of Siwan strongman and former MP Mohammad Shahabuddin, BJP sitting MPs Rama Devi (Sheohar), Janardan Singh Sigriwal (Maharajganj) and Sanjay Jaiswal (West Champaran).

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