Polling for Presidential elections in Sri Lanka has concluded with around 80 per cent voting reported from all over the country.
The voting remained largely peaceful with stray incidents of election violations and one incident of firing on a bus carrying minority voters.
The Tamil-dominated north and east regions have also recorded voting of around 70 per cent, which is higher than the last elections.
Counting of votes has begun this evening with postal ballots being counted first. Results are expected by tomorrow.
A candidate needs to poll over 50 per cent of valid votes to be declared a winner, else the second preference votes will have to be counted.
There is close contest seen between former defence secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Minister Sajith Premadasa even as there are 35 candidates in the fray. Both candidates have campaigned mainly on the plank of national security and good governance.
This is the first time in Sri Lanka’s history that neither of sitting President or Prime minister is contesting the elections.
Earlier, police said some unidentified persons blocked and fired on buses carrying voters near Anuradhapura. There were no casualties reported and police is investigating the matter.
An election monitor agency reported that there were some attempts to coerce voters to vote for a particular candidate.
