‘Why did you cast my vote?’

A stalwart supporter of Awami League vented his anger when the Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL) man supposedly cast his vote in favour of "boat" on the Electronic Voting Machine (EVM).

The incident took place around 10am at booth no 2 of Bakalia Teachers Training College's male polling station under Ward no 17.

Shouting at the ruling party men, Jasim Uddin said: "Why are you doing this? I was supposed to vote for the boat but you pushed the button without my permission.”

"I opened the EVM machine but they pressed it without my consent," said Jasim, joint convenor of the voting centre operation committee formed by ward level Awami League centring the Chittagong City Corporation (CCC) polls.

He also locked into an altercation with a ruling party man while another member of the same party tried to mollify him by taking him away from the polling booth. 

The highly anticipated elections to the Chittagong City Corporation (CCC) concluded with a low voter turnout and widespread violence that resulted in deaths as well as suspension of voting at polling centres.

Two people died from injuries received in violent clashes between supporters of Awami League backed and rival candidates within hours of the commencement of voting.

Voting in the CCC election, which was postponed 10 months ago due to the pandemic, began around 8am and continued till 4pm without any break through use of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs).

Other than Awami League backed Rezaul Karim Chowdhury and BNP backed Shahadat Hossain, five more candidates were contesting for the mayoral post this time.

Additionally, 237 people were in the race for 39 councillor seats and 14 reserved councillor seats for women.