T’gana SEC gears up for urban body elections

After successfully conducting gram panchayat elections across Telangana in three phases in December, the state election commission (SEC) is now gearing up to conduct elections to municipalities and municipal corporations across the state, people familiar with the development said on Friday.

According to a senior SEC official privy to the matter, the elections to the urban local bodies were likely to be held in the third week of February and the schedule for the elections was expected in the first week.

In all, 117 municipalities with 2630 wards; and six municipal corporations – Kothagudem, Karimnagar, Mahabubnagar, Mancherial, Nizamabad and Ramagundam – comprising 366 wards in total, will go to polls.

The SEC has already begun the preparations to this effect and issued a series of instructions to district collectors and municipal commissioners. State election commissioner Rani Kumudini directed them to prepare the final voters’ list by January 12, upload the draft list of polling stations on the T-POLL mobile application by January 13, and publish final photo voter lists, polling station-wise, by January 16.

The commissioner asked district-level authorities to ensure that ballot boxes and other essential election materials were kept ready well in advance. It clarified that the 2019 electoral rolls will be taken as the base for the preparation of the new voters’ list.

The SEC further directed that the final voters’ list be made available at all polling stations within the respective ward limits, enabling voters to easily identify their polling centres and booth details.

She instructed booth-level officers (BLOs) to physically verify voter details at polling stations. She also noted that provisions have been made for online voter registration, corrections, and deletions.

To ensure strict enforcement of the Model Code of Conduct, the SEC ordered the formation of flying squads and static surveillance teams across all districts. She asked district collectors to ensure the availability of basic infrastructure required for conducting the elections, including appointment of returning officers, assistant returning officers, polling staff, flying squads and sitting squads to closely monitor the election process.

As the SEC stepped up the preparations, the Congress held an extended meeting of the state Congress Committee (PCC) at Gandhi Bhavan on Thursday. Chief minister A Revanth Reddy issued clear and forceful directions to party leaders and cadre, urging them to go all out to ensure victory in the civic polls.

Recalling that the Congress secured 66% of the seats in the recent sarpanch elections, Revanth Reddy said the party must now hoist the Congress flag in every municipality in the upcoming elections. He said the Congress came to power in the assembly elections solely due to the hard work of grassroots workers.

“It is now the responsibility of the leadership to ensure the victory of those workers in the municipal polls. I will campaign door-to-door, not just lane-to-lane, to ensure the victory of our candidates,” Revanth Reddy said.

The PCC leadership announced that the chief minister will formally launch the election campaign for municipal polls with a massive public meeting at Jadcherla on February 3.

“This will be followed by a series of public meetings over the next nine days across the nine erstwhile undivided districts of the state. Each district’s campaign responsibility will be assigned to a cabinet minister to ensure effective mobilisation and coordination,” PCC President Mahesh Kumar Goud said.