SECUNDERABAD: Unlike crores of voters across the state, electors in the Secunderabad Cantonment assembly constituency cast two votes — one for the Cantonment assembly constituency and the other for Malkajgiri parliamentary constituency — on Monday.
Secunderabad Cantonment assembly segment is part of the Malkajgiri parliamentary constituency. The Secunderabad Cantonment assembly bypoll was necessitated following the death of BRS MLA Lasya Nanditha in a road accident in February. Accordingly, the chief electoral officer, Telangana, has made arrangements for two separate EVMs in all 232 polling stations in the Secunderabad Cantonment. There are 2,53,706 electors, including 1,26,699 male, 1,26,997 female and 10 others.
Voters utilised their right to vote by waiting in queues from 7am onwards in the Secunderabad Cantonment assembly segment. Initially, the voting was dull and till 9am just 6.28% of voters cast their votes, which gradually increased to 50.34% when last reports came in. TOI visited a few polling stations in the Cantonment constituency and saw voters standing in long lines because every voter had to cast two votes on two separate EVMs. For each voter, it took at least two to three minutes to cast votes, resulting in a long wait for the voters. A few voters spoke with TOI and said: “This is a rare occasion and, we cast two votes in this election.” Incidentally, the voters had similar experience in 2014. In fact, it would be difficult to predict the winner. BRS’ candidate Lasya Niveditha is banking on ‘sympathy’ factor, while Congress’ Sri Ganesh and Dr Vamsha Tilak of BJP are hoping other factors would work in their favour.
BRS has fielded Ragidi Laxma Reddy from the Malkajgiri parliamentary constituency, while Congress nominee is Suneetha Mahender Reddy and BJP candidate Eatala Rajender.
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