Gaya, April 16: Twenty-four members of Red Army, the guerrilla squad of CPI(Maoist), raided a polling booth in Singhpur village under Banke Bazaar police station area of Imamganj Assembly segment of Gaya (part of Aurangabad Parliamentary constituency) shortly after voting began in the morning.

According to eyewitnesses the rebels took the security by surprise and directed the Home Guard and District Armed Police to surrender all weapons. Reportedly, their protests provoked the rebels to open fire resulting in the death of a constable and a jawan and injury to two women who were at the polling station number 244 of the Imamganj Assembly segment. The deceased have been identified as Home Guard Ram Deo Khar and Constable B.K. Chaudhary.

Confirming the deaths, inspector-general (Gaya) Sunil Kumar said the rebels also stole four police rifles and beat up two Home Guards Ram Roop Mandal and Upendra Ram.

The injured women have been referred to the Anugrah Narain Magadh Medical College and Hospital.

As the attack began, voters scurried away from the booth to a safer place and polling was completely abandoned. Remaining security evacuated the poll personnel and brought to the safety of Banke Bazaar cluster centre.

This operation also created panic in neighbouring areas and according to reports, a sizeable number of polling parties left for their cluster centres much before the 3pm deadline when voting ended. District magistrate (DM) Sanjay Kumar denied having received reports of early departure, but assured that he would look into the matter. According to the DM, only the polling party of the booth number-9 of Imamganj Assembly segment could not reach their station, due to the unavailability of police escorts. Reports of four more instances of booth abandonment came in from stations under Dobhi police station area, however, reports were formally denied by the DM. Barachatti, another red zone, witnessed heavy exchange of fire between Indo Tibet Border Police and rebels, but no casualty was reported, said IG Kumar.

The district, including the Gaya town Assembly segment, registered an extremely dull voters’ turnout.

As per preliminary estimates, the turn out hovered on the lower side of 40 per cent. According to official estimates, 15 per cent of the 22 lakh district electorates exercised their franchise in the first three hours of polling, a period that usually registers brisk polling. Activist S.B. Bhaskar attributed the low turnout to general apathy, heat and fear among the voters.