A queue outside a Darjeeling booth. A Telegraph picture

Darjeeling, May 10: Subash Ghisingh today cast his vote for the first time in eight years, bringing with him voters who had stayed away from the past three Lok Sabha polls that his Gorkha National Liberation Front had boycotted.

Darjeeling constituency recorded a turnout of 60 per cent. Out of an electorate of 12 lakh, more than a third come from Kalimpong, Kurseong and Darjeeling and the hills recorded a 55 per cent turnout in one leap from 12.5 per cent in 1999.

Voters ignored heavy morning fog and drizzle to form long queues outside polling booths as the green flags with the three stars and a khukri fluttered almost everywhere in this sleepy subdivision.

The CPM had won the seat on the last three occasions with the GNLF boycotting the polls. This time, the Congress has been riding high on a confidence wave after Ghisingh decided to back its candidate Dawa Narbula.

Nauraj Thapa, a resident of Kurseong, was simply happy. “We are voting after a long time since the GNLF had boycotted consecutive parliamentary elections in 1996, 1998 and 1999. There is a general eagerness to vote among the people.”

The number of voters swelled in the afternoon once the weather bettered.

The turnout in the hills, along with 64 per cent polled in the plains, has delighted the Congress.

In 1999, 46.21 per cent votes were cast in the constituency. “The turnout (this time) has been very good and I expect to lead by at least 2 lakh votes from the three hill subdivisions, which will definitely ensure a victory for me,” said Narbula, who is also being supported by the People’s Democratic Front, which includes the Congress.

“That the people have come out to vote in large numbers is proof enough that the verdict will go in favour of the Congress,” Narbula said while visiting a Kurseong booth in the afternoon.

In Gayanbari and Tindharia, the CPM did not even put up their polling agents. “How can they dare enter our territory,” said a young GNLF supporter who emerged from a booth with a dot on his right index finger.