Telangana, the youngest state will be electing its Lok Sabha MPs on Thursday. The state has 2.97 crore voters who will vote in a single-phase election.
Polling in 16 constituencies will be held from 7 am to 5 pm. However, in 13 Maoist-affected Assembly segments bordering Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra, polling will end at 4 pm. The state has 34,603 polling stations including 5,749 sensitive stations.
In Nizamabad, the constituency from where Kalvakuntla Kavitha, daughter of Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, is contesting from, the voting will begin at 8 am and conclude at 6 am. Nizamabad is a peculiar constituency this elections as a total of 185 candidates including 178 farmers are contesting the elections to highlight their problems. The farmers are agitated at ruling political parties at the state and Centre failing to fulfil the promise of setting up a national turmeric board ensuring a steady price for their produce.
To accommodate 185 candidates, the Election Commission is using 12 Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) in each polling booth. Officials will conduct mock-polling for two hours from 6 am. Hence, polling will begin at 8 am.
Election Commission authorities informed that they would set up a total of 4,169 web casting centres across the 34,604 polling stations.
Officials also said that the police will monitor 5749 'critical polling stations' through CCTV.
According to officials, 55,946 police personnel from Telangana state police and additional 9,700 personnel from other states, 145 companies of central armed forces and 25 companies of Telangana State Special Police are being deployed for the smooth conduct of elections.
Elections are being held in 7 phases for the 543 constituencies.
In 2014, the TRS won 11 MP seats, followed by Congress with 2 seats and 1 TDP, 1 YSRCP, 1 BJP and 1 AIMIM. TDP MP Malla Reddy and YSRCP MP Ponguleti Srinivasa Rao later defected to the TRS party.
Along with Telangana Lok Sabha elections, Andhra Pradesh will be simultaneously voting for 175 MLAs and 25 MPs. The results though will be announced on May 23.