Hyderabad, Nov. 5: Polling began across Andhra Pradesh on Thursday for MPTC and ZPTC elections amid tight security arrangements.
Voting started at 7 a.m. across 31,460 polling centres. Around 2.61 crore voters are eligible to cast their votes. However, polling in rain affected areas has been postponed.
Elections are being held for 582 ZPTC and 7,767 MPTC seats. A total of 21,012 candidates are contesting, including 2,169 for ZPTC seats and 18,843 for MPTC seats.
The State Election Commission (SEC) deployed 2,01,116 polling officers and other staff to manage the election process. Elections for 77 ZPTC and 2,051 MPTC seats were declared unanimous.
Andhra Pradesh MPTC, ZPTC Elections | Heavy Security in Sensitive Areas
The SEC identified 8,904 polling stations as sensitive and 7,160 as highly sensitive. It deployed additional forces in Palnadu, Annamayya, YSR Kadapa and Tirupati districts following earlier incidents of violence.
CCTV cameras have been installed at 16,084 polling centres. The SEC also arranged webcasting at 6,000 centres and videography at 6,507 centres.
Meanwhile, heavy rainfall forced the postponement of polling in five mandals across Eluru and East Godavari districts. Voting at two polling centres in another mandal was also postponed. Polling in these areas will take place on Friday.
The SEC said repolling, if required, would take place on November 6. Vote counting is scheduled for November 7.
The polling was originally scheduled for November 4. However, the SEC rescheduled it after urban local body elections were postponed following a Supreme Court order.
The TDP led NDA coalition is confident of securing a majority. The TDP, Jana Sena and BJP alliance had won 95 of the 100 urban local bodies that went to polls on November 1.
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