LUDHIANA: The Zila Parishad and Panchayat Samiti polls in the district witnessed about 58% voting on Wednesday. The polling by and large was peaceful for 236 zones of Panchayat Samiti and 25 zones of Zila Parishad, even though the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) leaders accused ruling Congress of booth capturing at several places. According to ADC cum Additional district election officer, Shena Aggarwal, only one complaint was received, which was being looked into.Meanwhile the senior leaders of Congress and the SAD had a field day, as they were seen mobilising the workers and visiting polling booths all over the day. Most activity was witnessed around Dakha and nearby areas where former SAD MLA Manpreet Singh Ayali, Congress MP Ravneet Singh Bittu , Cabinet Minister Bharat Bhushan Ashu, MLA Sanjay Talwar and others were seen visiting almost every polling booth. There were several occasions when supporters of both parties came close enough to get into a brawl.Earlier during the day, Ayali accused Bittu and other Congress leaders of rigging and he even came live on Facebook making these claims. Speaking to TOI Ayali described their conduct as the worst ever display of goonda politics by Congress. “Several goons led by MP Bittu captured several booths in Sidhwa bet, Talwandi Kalan, Leeyan , Jangpura , Bharowal Khurd and they also prevented voters from voting and cast bogus votes. Congress leaders and workers captured 25 polling booths under Dakha constituency as they knew that if polling was held here in a fair manner, Congress would not be able to win even a single zone,” Ayali claimed.He also claimed to have recorded videos of the booth capturing incidents and the statements of the presiding officers of some booths admitting that the Congress workers had entered the polling booths just before 4 pm. “We have already complained to deputy commissioner about this and similar complaint will be lodged with state election commissioner about this unprecedented act. We will demand repolling at all these booths under the surveillance of paramilitary forces,” he said.However MP Bittu refuted the claims of booth capturing describing them as baseless.“Every Punjabi knows which is the party of goons and uses violence and terror as means to win elections. The charges of booth capturing levelled by Ayali are totally baseless, in fact everywhere elections were held peacefully and our workers exercised proper restraint even after instigation by the SAD leaders and workers,” he said.Bittu also mentioned that visit to booths was being done to boost the morale of the workers deployed there and assess the ground situation. “Ayali is known for these tactics and is playing a victim card to hide is failures. If our party has captured booths why no other leader from his own party in other areas like Khanna, Jagraon, Samrala has raised similar allegations,” he said.Meanwhile ADC cum Additional district election officer, Shena Aggarwal said, "We have recieved one complaint regarding booth capturing at Dakha, the complaint has been lodged by SAD and based upon the complaint we are looking into the matter and based on veracity of facts appropriate action will be taken."Out of total 1542 polling booths in Ludhiana, district administration had already declared 13 as hyper sensitive and 128 as sensitive polling booths majority of these were identified to be in Jagraon and Khanna.Earlier at the start of the polling the turnout was a bit low and in the first two hours the turnout was recorded at 8.20 % till 10 am and by 12 pm the turnout was 20.65%, which reached 39.75% by 2 pm. In Dehlon block the total voting percentage was at 56.78, in Doraha it was recorded at 64.55. In Khanna block 62.62% polling was recorded while in Pakhowal block voting percentage was 56.19. In Samrala block voting percentage was 63.18 while in Sidhwan Bet, 64.9% polling was recorded and in Sudhar block polling was 54.07%..

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