Gandhinagar: The state of Gujarat is witnessing another round of elections today, this time at the village level. General or midterm polls are being held in a total of 3,541 gram panchayats, while by-elections are taking place in 353 gram panchayats.

The State Election Commission (SEC) had announced general/midterm/divisional elections for 4,564 gram panchayats last month. Of these, 751 have been declared “Samras,” meaning they were won without any contest. In the remaining 3,813 gram panchayats, elections are not being held in 271 due to some wards in these panchayats going Samras or due to a lack of candidates. Therefore, voting is taking place in 3,541 gram panchayats today.

Furthermore, by-elections were also announced for 3,524 gram panchayats. However, polling is being held in only 353 of them, as 3,171 seats were either declared uncontested or did not receive any valid nominations.

Voting is being conducted using ballot papers and ballot boxes and will take place from 7 am to 6 pm.

In total, voting is being held for 3,656 sarpanch seats and 16,224 member seats across gram panchayats under the general/midterm/divisional or by-elections. Approximately 81 lakh voters are expected to cast their votes in this election, the SEC said on Friday.

A total of 10,479 polling stations have been set up, including 3,939 classified as sensitive and 336 as highly sensitive.

Additional police forces and patrolling have been deployed at polling stations where voting is underway. Special security arrangements have been made at sensitive and highly sensitive locations to ensure voters can cast their votes without fear. DeshGujarat