Hyderabad: The Notification for Local Body Elections is expected to be issued in August second week. The State Government has already asked the State Election Commission (SEC) to make all arrangements for local body polls including the finalization of the schedule by August first week. The government is planning to hold Gram Panchayat elections in the first phase followed by Mandal and Zilla Parishad and Municipal elections.

Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy instructed all the departments to complete the formalities for the distribution of the scheme benefits including new ration cards to ensure no violation of election code which is being into the force soon after the SEC announced schedule for the conduct of local body elections anytime after August 10.

In the wake of protracted delay in conducting the elections, Telangana High Court has already ordered the state government to complete the local body elections by September end this year. Sources said that the only challenge before the government is to implement 42 per cent BC quota in the local body polls since the approval of ordinance to BC reservation was pending before Governor Jishnu Dev Varma. The government was expecting the Governor will also take a call on the issue by August first week and then the election process will be started. The SEC authorities already prepared the revised electoral rolls and the Panchayat Raj department announced the total number of MPTC and ZPTC segments as part of the election preparations. The Municipal Administration and Urban Development department also finalized the number of wards and merger of villages with the surrounding municipal bodies for elections.