Hyderabad: The Election Commission on Sunday announced that elections would be held on April 11 for 17 Lok Sabha seats in Telangana state and 25 Lok Sabha in Andhra Pradesh. Elections would be held to the 175-seat AP Assembly the same day.
While announcing the election schedule in Delhi, Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora said that the EC had received complaints with regard to alleged deletion of names of voters in AP and TS.
The EC had sent teams to both states to inquire into the matter. After the teams submit a report the EC would take appropriate action, Mr Arora said.
In 2014, elections were held to the Telangana region on April 30 and in Seemandhra on May 7. The bifurcation of states had been announced by then. The states were formed in June.
As per the final electoral rolls notified by the Election Commission, TS has 2,95,18,964 voters including 1,48,42,619 men, 1,46,74,977 women and 1,368 belonging to the third gender.
AP had 3,69,33,091 voters, among them 1,83,24,588 men, 1,86,04,742 and 3,761 belonging to the third gender.
After the announcement of the schedule Telangana state Chief Electoral Officer Rajat Kumar said the model code of conduct had come into force and no new works could be announced or started. Photographs of politicians will be removed from government websites, he said.
Mr Kumar that only three vehicles would be allowed on the premises of the returning officer at the time of filing nominations, which ends on March 25. Not more than five members should accompany the candidate to the returning officer, Mr Kumar said.
All news related to elections will be monitored round the clock, Mr Kumar said. He said the Chief Election Office in the state would be ready with Electronic Voting Machines and VVPATs by March 12, a month ahead of the polls.
The TRS welcomed the decision of the Election Commission to conduct elections in the first phase.
Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao had represented to the EC earlier to hold the elections in the first phase so that the government could take up elections to the zilla parishad and mandal parishad in the gap between the Lok Sabha polling date to the date of results.
After the April 11 elections, the state government will have 40 days till the results are announced. The state government will complete the pre-election process to conduct district and mandal polls any day after the announcement of the Lok Sabha results, sources said.
