Guwahati, May 16 (Inditop) Counting of votes for 24 parliamentary seats in the northeast began Saturday amid heavy security arrangements, officials said.
Counting of votes began at 8 a.m. in the seven northeastern states of Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura, Mizoram, Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland.
“We expect the final results by late afternoon,” said Assam chief electoral officer H. Narzary.
Elections to the 24 seats were held in two phases last month with the fate of 319 candidates to be decided in the counting of votes.
Assam has the maximum number of seats with 14, followed by two each in Tripura, Meghalaya, Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh, and one each in Nagaland and Mizoram.
In the 2004 general elections, the Congress party won 11 of the 24 seats, of which nine were from Assam, while the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) bagged four seats, two each in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh.
The remaining were from small regional parties and independents, besides two Left candidates from Tripura and one from the Nationalist Congress Party.
