The Election Commission on Friday ordered repolling in 15 booths of South 24-Parganas after detecting several irregularities during the April 29 polls.

Repolling will be held at 11 booths in Magrahat Paschim and four in the Diamond Harbour Assembly segments between 7am and 6pm on Saturday.

The EC is also considering a repoll in 30 booths in the Falta Assembly segment.

Sources said the poll panel received several complaints of irregularities at these booths after the second and last phase of voting ended on Wednesday.

"Chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar took the complaints seriously and asked special observer Subrata Gupta to undertake a scrutiny of the election process in the booths,” an EC official said.

Gupta visited Diamond Harbour — the Assembly segments concerned fall within the jurisdiction of Diamond Harbour subdivision — and examined the video footage from the booths from where the complaints had come.

“The scrutiny was carried out throughout Thursday night, and recommendations for repolling were sent for 45 booths on Friday morning. Of them, 30 were in Falta and the remaining 15 were in Mahrahat Paschim and Diamond Harbour. The order on Falta is yet to come,” the official said.

Sources said repolling proposals were sent after it was found that the EVM buttons of some candidates had been taped in a few booths and CCTV cameras were not operational for the better part of the polling in some others.

"The EC had earlier declared that it would not tolerate irregularities in the booths during the polls. Now, as several irregularities have been detected in these booths, it did not hesitate to announce repolling there," said a source.

A section of officials said the measures undertaken by the EC to conduct free and fair polls could not be implemented properly in around 45 booths in the Diamond Harbour Assembly segments from where complaints of malpractice were reported.

"Now, it remains to be seen what steps are initiated to ensure smooth polling when the electors come out to vote again tomorrow," said an official.