Barring minor incidents of violence, the Assembly elections in Telangana concluded peacefully on Thursday, November 30. The state, however, witnessed poor voter turnout. The approximate voter turnout recorded in the state was 64.14%, three percentage points less than the previous elections. In 2018, 67% of voter turnout was registered.
Jangaon district saw the highest voting percentage at 80.23% this time, while the lowest was recorded in Hyderabad district at 40.51%.
Jangaon constituency saw the highest voter turnout at 83.34%, and Yakutpura constituency in Hyderabad recorded the poorest voter turnout at 27.87%.
In Hyderabad, Charminar recorded 34.2%, Chandrayangutta 39%, Bahadurpura 39.11%, Goshamahal 45.79%, Jubilee Hills 44.20%, Karwan 40.49%, Khairatabad 45.50%, Kukkatpally 42.60%, LB Nagar 43.59%, Malkajgiri 46.80%, Nampally 32.40%, Quthbullapur 52.80%, Rajendra Nagar 44.30%, Sanathnagar 45.10%, Secunderabad 45.01%, Secunderabad Cantonment 47.14%, Serilingampally 48.60%, and Uppal 46.20%.
Elections were held for the 119 constituencies in the state, where the primary contest was between the ruling Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) and the Congress. Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao’s BRS faces a huge anti-incumbency challenge this time as the party has been in power for two terms since 2014.
While the BRS contested in all the 119 seats, the Congress contested in 118, allocating one seat, Kothagudem, to its ally CPI. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) contested in 111 seats while the remaining seats were given to its ally, the Jana Sena Party. Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) contested from nine seats in Hyderabad.
Polling was held in a total of 35,655 polling stations, out of which 10,969 stations were identified as critical. The highest number of critical polling stations were identified in the districts of Wanaparthy, Yadadri Bhuvanagiri, Jayashankar Bhupalpally, Jogulamba Gadwal, Medak, Nalgonda, and select parts of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC). The Election Commission of India (ECI) had ordered the deployment of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) in all critical polling stations to ensure maximum security.
Nearly 45,000 state police forces were deployed for the elections, including 3,000 people from other departments and 50 companies with the Telangana State Special Police. Home Guards from Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Odisha, Tamil Nadu, and Chattisgarh were also deployed. In total, 2.08 lakh officials were deployed for election duty.
In 2018, the BRS (then TRS) had won 88 seats (46.9% vote share), the Congress 19 (28.4% vote share), BJP 1 (7% vote share), TDP 2 (3.5%), and Others 2.