548 candidates file nominations for 25 Lok Sabha seats

Amaravati: As the process of filing of nominations for the ensuing Assembly and Lok Sabha elections is completed, Chief Electoral Officer Gopalakrishna Dwivedi revealed on Tuesday that a total of 548 candidates filed their nominations to contest for 25 Lok Sabha constituencies across the State.

Out of which, highest number of LS nominations have been received for Nandyal Lok Sabha constituency in Kurnool district. In all, 38 candidates filed nominations for Nandyala LS, while the least number of affidavits were filed for Chittoor LS constituency which is 13, he said, while addressing at a press conference at the Secretariat on Tuesday.

With regard to Assembly elections, for 175 constituencies in the State, the EC has received 3,925 affidavits. Out of which 61 candidates are in fray for Nandyal Assembly constituency and the least number of affidavits were filed for Parvathipuram and Palakonda, which is just 10. The CEO said that more than 15 nominations each were received for 118 Assembly constituencies in the State.

Dwivedi said that they have to arrange more than 2 EVMs for each Assembly and LS constituency where more than 15 candidates are in the fray. He said that the present EVMs can only accommodate 15 candidates. He said that the NOTA option will be available at the end of the list of all candidates.

The controversy over the deletion and additions of the voters in the electoral rolls has helped the Election Commission of India in creating more awareness among people on the need for enrolling their names, he explained.

The CEO said the number of voters increased by 7.2 per cent in 2019 when compared to the electoral rolls in 2014.Total No. of voters for 2014 elections was 3,67,21, 608, in which male voters were 1,82,54,65 and female voters l,84,63,770 and transgender 3,187.

As on March 25, 2019, the total number of voters are 3,93,45,717, out of which male are 1,94,62,339, female are 1,98,79,421 and transgender 3,957.During the last two months, 25,54,449 voters were added to the list and 1,41,823 voters were deleted from the list.

The CEO pointed out that they were getting more fake complaints through the cVIGIL app and requested people to stop such prank messages to save the valuable time of the officials engaged in electioneering. He appealed to people to give correct information. He said that they lodged 17 FIRs based on the cVIGIL information so far.

When asked about the problems in scrutinising nominations, he said that the entire responsibility will be on returning officers and no one will question their decisions as they hold quasi judicial authority.If anybody has any complaints, then they have to approach the High Court, he said.