Telangana: Low urban voter turnout marks graduate elections

Hyderabad: Polling for the two Graduate constituencies in Telangana and two Teachers constituencies in AP concluded on Sunday peacefully barring a few stray incidents.

Graduate voters in Hyderabad city and urban areas in Ranga Reddy district did not show much interest in the polls, which saw a keen fight between TRS candidate G. Devi Prasada Rao and BJP candidate (supported by TD) S. Ramachandra Rao.

Out of the 2,96,318 registered graduate voters in Hyderabad, Ranga Reddy and Mah-bubnagar districts, only 39 per cent voted, said chief electoral officer Bhanwarlal. Of this Mahbubnagar district, which has 68,000 electors, polled approximately 62 per cent.

Hyderabad City, which has 90,000 registered voters, recorded polling of 37 per cent. Ranga Reddy district, comprising urban areas like LB Nagar, Kukatpally and Serilin-gampally, saw only 11 per cent votes being polled against a total of 1,38,000 registered voters.

In 2007, the average polling in the Graduate MLC elections was almost 50 per cent, which came down to an all-time low of 26 per cent in 2009. The turnout saw an impro-vement to 39 per cent this year.

Meanwhile both front-runners, Mr Devi Prasada Rao (TRS) and Mr Ramachandra Rao (BJP), said that they were confident of winning when the votes will be counted on March 25.

For the MLC polls for the Warangal-Khamm-am-Nalgonda constitu-ency, polling was 51 per cent among the total electorate of 2,81,138.