Counting of votes for HP assembly polls on Friday

SHIMLA: The fate of Himachal Pradesh's 11th Vidhan Sabha will be decided on Friday when counting of votes will be taken up for all the 68 assembly seats in the state which went to polls in two phases recently.
    
The Election Commission has made elaborate arrangements for counting of votes across the hill state on Friday.
    
About 5000 persons have been deputed on counting duty in 41 locations, Chief Electoral officer Manisha Nanda said.
   
Counting work will be done on a new genesys software for faster delivery of results. Forty one engineers from Bharat Electronic Limited (BEL), Bangalore, will be on duty to ensure smooth funtioning of the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs).
    
Nanda said 68 observers will be on duty to supervise the counting process.
    
Out of a total of 45,44,166 electors in the state 32,75,924 cast their votes during assembly elections held on November 14 and December 19.
    
In seven districts out of a total of 12 districts female voting percentage has been recorded as being higher than that of male.
    
State election office sources said that the counting process which will start at 8 AM in the morning will start delivering results within over an hour. It is expected that by afternoon results of all the 68 seats will be out.
    
Important leaders whose fate will be unveiled on FRiday include Chief minister Virbhadra singh from Rohru constituency, BJP's Chief Ministerial nominee Prem Kumar Dhumal from Bamson, Speaker G R Mussafir (Pacchad), Ministers Vidya stokes (Kumarsain), Kaul Singh Thakur (Drang) and Raj Kishan Guar (Kullu).