5.26 per cent voted in 1 hour for Lok Sabha polls: Marri Shashidhar Reddy

Hyderabad: The Lok Sabha elections in Telangana have seen a significant jump in voting percentage in the last one hour — i.e. between 5 pm to 6 pm — in all 17 constituencies on April 11, according to a compliant lodged by Congress leader Marri Shashidhar Reddy.

“The voting percentage was 67 per cent at 5 pm on April 11, but the voting reached 73.2 per cent by the end of polling at 6 pm — showing a 6. 2 per cent voting in the last one hour,” Mr Reddy said in his complaint with the Election Commission.

“There is a significant difference in voting percentage between 5 pm and 6 pm on polling day. The average percentage of votes polled at 5 pm in all 17 parliamentary constituencies is 59.62 per cent, while the average percentage of votes at the end of the polling in all 17 constituencies was 64.32. This shows 5.26 per cent electorate had exercised their voting right in the last one hour,” Mr Reddy said.

He alleged that there has been an increase of 14.13 per cent in the Nizamabad constituency, which means about 2.19 lakh votes were polled after 5 pm. In Secunderabad, around 1.38 lakh votes were polled after 5 pm. It was quite similar in Khammam. “But Chevella presented a different scenario as the voting percentage in the constituency had actually declined by 0.58 per cent in the final hour, which means the total number of votes polled have decreased by 14,146 as compared to the votes polled at 5 pm, which working out to only 5 votes per person. This has to be explained differently, said Mr Reddy.

The office of the Election Commission is yet to reply to the complaint.