Mandal, ZP poll schedule tomorrow

Hyderabad: The State Election Commission may issue the schedule for the elections to the Zilla Parishad Territorial Constituencies and to the Mandal Parishad Territorial Constituencies on April 20.

State Election Commissioner V Nagi Reddy held a meeting with the collectors and superintendents of police on Thursday and examined the preparedness. All the collectors and SPs of the 32 districts have attended the meeting.

Speaking to the media, Nagi Reddy said that the officials are well prepared to conduct the polls. He said that they have been told to be ready to hold the polls whenever the Commission announces schedule.

The security aspect has also been discussed with the district officials, he said. According to sources, the SEC has discussed the preparedness at district level.

The officials have informed about the steps being taken by them to hold the polls. A few districts have completed issuing of Gazette Notifications about the details of the MPTC and ZPTC posts.

The SEC has inquired about the availability of ballot boxes for the polls as the elections would be held through ballot papers. The printing of ballot papers and other issues have been discussed.

The officials have said that about 1 lakh staff, both polling and security, would be required for the polls as they would be held in 30,000 polling booths.

In order to ensure that the staff is available, it has been felt in the meeting to hold the elections in two or three phases.

Sources said that the district officials felt in the meeting that it would be better to hold polls in two phases in few districts and in three phases in other districts, depending on the situation.

According to the information available from official sources, in the first phase, out of 539 ZPTCs and 5,817 MPTCs, 212 ZPTCs and 2,365 MPTCs will go to polls.

The notification for them may be issued on April 20. For the second phase, election notification is to be out on April 26 and the polls will be held for 199 ZPTCs, 2109 MPTCs on May 10.

Similarly, for the third phase of polls will be held for 124 ZPTCs and 1343 MPTCs on May 14 and the notification may be issued on April 30 or on May 1.

The State Election Commission has made arrangements in polling stations based on number of voters.

While there are 6,540 polling stations for 400 voters each, 25,487 polling stations will be set up for 600 voters each. Accordingly, the election body appointed 64,014 presiding and assistant presiding officers for 32,007 polling stations.

Similarly, the election body has appointed a total of 1.47 lakh polling staff for the polls. Of which, 1.21 lakh will be on poll duty, including three polling staff for each polling station.

The officials also set up 13,651 locations, 510 distribution centres, 129 counting centres and strong rooms for the purpose.