EC announces polls for Vellore Lok Sabha seat on 5 August, Patkura Assembly seat in Odisha on 20 July

New Delhi: The election to Vellore Lok Sabha constituency, which was countermanded due to excess use of money power, will now be held on 5 August, the Election Commission (EC) announced on Thursday. It said the election to Patkura Assembly seat in Odisha will be held on 20 July. The election was postponed there twice — first in the wake of demise of the Biju Janata Dal candidate and later due to Cyclone Fani. Counting of votes in Patkura will take place on 24 July, the EC said. [caption id=“attachment_5171781” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  File image of the Election Commission of India. Courtesy: News18[/caption] Polling for Vellore Lok Sabha seat was scheduled for 18 April, along with the other constituencies of Tamil Nadu, but was cancelled on 16 April following the recovery of a huge amount of cash allegedly from an associate of a DMK leader. A government notification rescinding the polls had said the Election Commission was “fully satisfied that the current electoral process in Vellore has been seriously vitiated on account of unlawful activities of certain candidates and some workers of the political party”. It had added that in the considered opinion of the EC, going ahead with the poll process in Vellore in such a vitiated atmosphere would “severely jeopardise the conduct of a free-and-fair election”. The notification for the 5 August election will be issued on 11 July. The nomination process will begin the same day and the last date for filing papers is 18 July. The last date for withdrawing from the electoral battle is 22 July and the counting of votes will be taken up on 9 August. This was perhaps the first time that the election to a Lok Sabha constituency was cancelled over use of money power. The bypoll to the RK Nagar Assembly seat in Tamil Nadu was cancelled in April, 2017 following a similar seizure of huge amount of cash allegedly meant for bribing voters. Once the results are announced, the Lok Sabha will have its full strength of 543 elected members. There is a provision to nominate two members from the Anglo-Indian community.