Bogus voting alleged in Tirupati town bank elections
Over 45 contestants from various political parties and independents were in the election fray
TIRUPATI: The ruling YSR Congress and Opposition Telugu Desam have traded charges of rigging and bogus voting during the elections to the Tirupati Urban Cooperative Bank (town bank), which concluded peacefully on Wednesday.
The temple city witnessed noisy scenes throughout the day with the rival parties alleging large-scale irregularities such as rigging and bogus voting by their rival sides in the course of the polling for the 12 governing director posts.
Over 45 contestants from various political parties and independents were in the election fray.
Ahead of the polling, the police took a few TDP leaders into preventive custody. Former MLA M Sugunamma, former TUDA chairman Narasimha Yadav, former town bank chairman Puligoru Murali and candidates Bullet Ramana, JB Ramana and P Valamuni were among them.
In a letter to Tirupati collector, TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu urged him to cancel the process and re-conduct polling in a free and fair manner. He accused the ruling YSRC of mobilising bogus voters by carrying duplicate membership ID cards of the bank to cast extra votes in favour of YSRC candidates.
“The YSRC leaders also illegally detained non-YSRC voters and contestants with the help of the police in order to prevent them from voting. The police are following diktat of the ruling party and this is a gross violation of fundamental rights. Clearly, the YSRC leaders are hatching a plan to swindle the funds of the bank,” Naidu alleged.
Tirupati MLA Bhumana Karunakar told the media that the bank elections were held peacefully, baring the ruckus created by the Opposition. He claimed that the bogus voting allegation was a drama enacted by the TDP.
He alleged that the TDP brought in a few bogus voters and created a drama at the polling centres to malign the ruling party.
Tirupati urban Co-Op town bank is one of the leading cooperative banks in the district with a Rs 430 crore turnover per year. It has 1.12 lakh shareholders across the urban district and holds nearly Rs 292 crore in fixed deposits.
Political parties seek control of the town co-op bank to also consolidate each party’s position in the next assembly/LS elections and thereby checkmate their rivals in the temple city.