Shawdesh Desk: Awami League mayoral candidates Sheikh Fazle Noor Taposh and Atiqul Islam won a landslide victory in Saturday’s elections to Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC) and Dhaka North City Corporation (DNCC) respectively.

Taposh won the DSCC election, defeating his rival BNP candidate Ishraque Hossain. Atiq came out victorious by beating his rival BNP candidate Tabith Awal in the DNCC election. Taposh got 4,24,595 votes while his rival Ishraque bagged 2,36,512 votes.

Atiq got 4,47,211 votes while Tabith 2,64,161 votes. The Returning Officers unofficially declared Taposh and Atiq mayors of the DSCC and the DNCC respectively.
The Returning Officer unofficially declared Taposh and Atiq mayors of the Dhaka south city and Dhaka north city respectively.

Meanwhile, rejecting the poll results, the BNP enforced dawn to dusk hartal in the capital.

“We have rejected the polls completely. In protest, a dawn to dusk hartal will be observed tomorrow on Sunday,” BNP secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam told reporters at a briefing.

The entire polls were held for the first time under the Electronic Voting Machine (EVMs) despite strong opposition by the BNP.

The voting festivity started at 8:00 am and continued till 4:00 pm without any break.

But the voters turn out was very low in the elections held under the Electronic Voting Machine.
Sources in the Election Commission said that the voters turn out was about 25 per cent.

The EC expressed satisfaction as the polls were held in a free, fair and peaceful manner. “It was a good poll. Turn out of voters may be less than 30 percent. I think, the percentage will not cross the 30 per cent mark,” Chief Election Commissioner KH Nurul Huda told reporters after the polls.

Some 54, 63,467 voters were supposed to elect the new city mayors, councilors and reserved seat councilors under the EVM system.

DNCC has 30,10,273 voters, 1,318 polling centres and 7,846 voting rooms while DSCC has 24,53,194 voters, 1,150 centres and 6,588 booths.

Ruling party thanked the BNP for being in the field till the end of voting while the BNP brought various allegations of irregularities in the two elections.

The BNP also placed a 10-point written complaint before the EC.

“Prime Minister sought votes for a particular mayoral candidate during the election. It is not only the breach of electoral law but also a bad example for the country,” mentioned one of the complaints placed before the CEC Nurul Huda.

Some six mayoral aspirants vied the polls for DNCC while seven aspirants were for the DSCC.

A total of 77 reserved seat councilors vied for 18 reserved seats of DNCC while 82 were for 25 reserved posts of DSCC.

Some 251 councilor candidates contested in 54 wards of DNCC and 326 candidates were in 75 wards of DSCC.

The main battle was held between Atiqul Islam of AL and Tabith Awal of BNP in DNCC and Sheikh Fazle Noor Taposh of AL and Ishraq Hossain of BNP in DSCC.

Some 750 candidates contested the mayors, councilors and reserved seat posts in the two city corporations.

Out of 1,318 polling center of DNCC, some 876 centres have been marked as risky while 721 centres out of 1,150 of DSCC have also been marked as risky.

Members of Police, APBN, RAB, BGB, Ansar & VDP and coast guard have been deployed since January 30 and will remain vigil in voting areas till February 2.

A total 5,015 army personnel were deployed for providing technical support for the EVMS.

Two sergeants or corporals or lance-corporals or soldiers were deployed in each polling center.

A total 16 personnel, including four armed member of the police and two armed member of Ansar guarded each general voting centre while 18 personnel including six members of armed police were fielded at risky voting centres.

Some 28,868 EVMs were used in two city corporations —15,692 for DNCC and 13,176 for DSCC.