Assembly by-polls in Telangana begins

Hyderabad, July 27 (ANI): Polling for by-elections to 12 assembly constituencies, including five with ballot papers, in Andhra Pradesh's Telangana region began today.

For the first time after 1998, ballot papers staged a comeback in the bypolls.

With the total number of candidates exceeding the maximum limit of 64 for an electronic voting machine (EVM), the Election Commission (EC) was forced to conduct polling with ballot papers in five constituencies.

EVMs cannot be used with the existing technology if the total number of nominees is over 64.

State Congress president D Srinivas, TRS president K Chandrasekhar Rao's son K T Rama Rao are among prominent candidates in the fray.

The total number of electors in the 12 assembly segments is 23,59,228, including 11,75,117 men and 11,84,111 women.

The EC has identified 450 polling stations as hyper-sensitive and 460 as sensitive.

In addition to available district police forces, 80 companies of central paramilitary forces are providing security for the electoral exercise.

Twelve central observers and 2783 micro-observers would oversee the polling process. The number of polling officers is 13,915.

The counting of votes will be taken up on July 30. (ANI)