Jubilee Hills bypoll: Election authorities deny malpractices in voter enrolment

Hyderabad, Oct 13 Hyderabad District Election Officer on Monday denied malpractices in voter addition in Jubilee Hills Assembly constituency, where a by-election is scheduled to be held on November 11.

District Election Officer R. V. Karnan issued a clarification after an inquiry into some media reports alleging malpractices in voter addition in view of the high number of electors from individual addresses.

The inquiry was conducted into four cases where a large number of voters were found registered in each house.

There were allegations that 50 voters were registered under one door number, while 43 electors were found under another door number.

After the inquiry, the District Election Officer found that these names have been part of the final rolls for the 2023 Telangana State Legislative Assembly elections & 2024 Lok Sabha elections. He clarified that no new enrolments were made in the four addresses.

It was also found that a few of the mentioned house numbers have multiple residences, leading to a higher count of electors. Fifty voters were found at a house which has three floors and a penthouse. At another house, where 43 voters were found registered, there are 15 flats.

“In summary, it is observed that there is no change in the number of electors in the above-mentioned house numbers since 2023, and the allegations that these are newly enrolled voters are completely false,” said the District Election Officer.

Citing one of the door numbers with 43 voters, Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leaders had accused the Congress government in the state of ‘vote chori’.

According to them, several complaints had surfaced about voters being enrolled in multiple areas of the constituency just ahead of the by-election.

BRS working president K. T. Rama Rao accused Congress of ‘vote chori’. He displayed the list of 43 voters in one house.

BRS spokesperson Y Satish Reddy had cited the case of 43 voters under one house number. He had even claimed that these 43 voters included a voter who is basically a voter of a different constituency but enrolled in Jubilee Hills just for these elections.

Another BRS leader, Krishank Manne, alleged that voters from Nakrekal and Uppal constituencies were enrolled as voters in Jubilee Hills for the by-election.

As per the final electoral roll published recently, the constituency has 3,99,000 voters - 2,07,382 males, 1,91,593 females and 25 third-gender voters.

In the 2023 Assembly elections, the constituency had 3,85,287. Thus, there has been an increase of 3.49 per cent in votes.

The process for the by-election was set in motion on Monday with the Returning Officer issuing the notification.

The polling will be held on November 11, while the counting of votes will be taken up on November 14.

The by-election is necessitated by the death of sitting MLA Maganti Gopinath of BRS in June.

--IANS

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