Karimnagar: A total of 61 aspirants filed their papers for the October 30 Huzurabad Assembly byelection, when the process of accepting nominations ended on Friday.
On the final day, the main candidates filed their nomination papers: Gellu Srinivas Yadav of the TRS, BJP leader Etala Rajendar and Dr Balamuri Venkat of the Congress. Scrutiny of the nomination papers will be done on October 11 and the last day for withdrawal is October 13.
A large number of field assistants of the Employment Guarantee Scheme came to the office of the returning officer to file their nominations in protest against the state government removing them from their posts. When police officials prevented them from submitting their nominations, they staged a protest and raised slogans against Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao and finance minister T. Harish Rao.
As police commissioner Satyanarayana arrived at the scene, the field assistants urged him to let them file the nominations. He said they could do so but as per rules.
As soon as BJP candidate Rajendar left the place after filing the nomination, an unidentified person held out a knife (veta kodavali) in his hand and created panic among those present at the nomination centre. Eyebrows were raised as the police did not detain him.
Srinivas Yadav was accompanied by TRS leaders T. Harish Rao and Padi Koushik Reddy; Union minister Kishan Reddy and state party chief Bandi Sanjay went along with Rajendar and Congress leader Damodar Rajanarasimha and former MP Ponnam Prabhakar stood with Dr Venkat.
