Grad MLC polls: Hyderabad records 67.26% turnout, Warangal 76.41%

HYDERABAD: The Election Commission on Monday released the final polling percentage of Legislative Council elections held for two graduates constituency seats on Sunday.

The Warangal-Khammam-Nalgonda seat recorded 76.41 per cent turnout while it was 67.26 per cent in Hyderabad-Ranga Reddy-Mahbubnagar seat. These figures show that the polling percentage has broken all records in graduates polls.

Going by the high poll percentage, Chief Electoral Officer Shashank Goel said that the counting of votes and announcement of results might take two days.
The EC has made all the arrangements for the counting of votes on Wednesday. If the results are announced based on only the first preference votes, the counting might take 36 hours. If the situation warrants counting of second and third preference votes, it might take up to 48 hours.

With a large number of candidates in the fray for both seats, jumbo ballot papers of the size of a newspaper were used for the first time. The ballot boxes were shifted to strong rooms soon after the polling.

The counting of votes for Hyderabad constituency will be held at the Saroornagar indoor stadium and for Warangal constituency at the market yard in Nalgonda.

Officials said the sorting of ballot papers into piles according to which candidate was chosen by each voter will be time-consuming. Moreover, the ballot papers also need to be sorted based on first, second, third preference votes, which also take time.