67 per cent votes polled in Meghalaya

Over 67 per cent of the 19.14 lakh voters of Meghalaya exercised their franchise in the Lok Sabha elections on Thursday amid reports of malfunctioning of voting machines from some booths, state Chief Electoral Officer Fredrick Roy Kharkongor said.

Meghalaya has two Lok Sabha constituencies - Shillong and Tura - and polling was peaceful in both the seats, he said.

The CEO said an FIR was lodged against BJP's Shillong candidate Sanbor Shullai for talking to media persons

within the premises of a polling station when voting is on, flouting Election Commission rules.

"The poll percentage has been recorded at 67.03 per cent as per inputs received from 2,500 of the 3617 polling stations," Kharkongor said in a press conference here.

He said information is awaited from other polling stations due to various reasons including network connectivity and the voting percentage may go up after getting the final figures.

In the 2014 general election, the overall voter turnout was 68 per