Uttarakhand Assembly Election 2012: Setback for BJP as EC receives only 30 per cent postal ballots

DEHRA DUN: In what appeared to be a setback for BJP in Uttarakhand, the Election Commission today said it has received less than 30 per cent of the postal ballots on which the ruling party is pinning its hopes.

"Till date, we have received just over 29,000 postal ballots out of the total one lakh ballots meant for the services", said state chief electoral officer Radha Raturi.

Raturi said a whopping 26,000 postal ballots have been rendered undelivered so far. Out of the 26,000 undelivered postal ballots, only 8 to 10 postal ballots could be redirected, she said.

"There is very less chance that we will get a healthy percentage of postal ballots since only few hours are left for the counting," she said.

The BJP, which has asked the Election Commission to probe into the lapses occurred into the undelivery of postal ballots, has been pinning its hopes on getting a healthy percentage of postal ballots in its favour.

Significantly, the Election Commission had put the onus on the army for the large number of undelivered postal ballots.