Telangana local body polls to be held in phased schedule

Hyderabad: The Telangana State Election Commission has finalised the schedule for Telangana local body polls. According to sources, the Commission will conduct gram panchayat elections in three phases, while it will hold MPTC and ZPTC polls in two phases. The Commission also prepared an action plan with a budget of ₹350 crore and has already released ₹3.08 crore.

Poll coverage and voter details

The polls will cover 1,67,03,168 rural voters across the state. Voters will directly elect representatives for 12,760 gram panchayats, 1,12,534 wards, 5,763 MPTCs and 565 ZPTCs. In addition, members will indirectly elect 565 MPP presidents and 31 ZP chairpersons.

Out of the total gram panchayats, 1,248 are fully reserved for Scheduled Tribes, 1,289 fall under scheduled areas, and 10,223 belong to other regions. Furthermore, eleven recognised political parties and 31 registered parties will contest the MPTC and ZPTC elections on their symbols. However, gram panchayat elections will remain non-party based.

Polling stations and staff arrangements

The voter profile shows 85,36,770 women, 81,65,894 men, and 504 others. The Commission will set up 31,377 polling stations for the MPTC and ZPTC elections. These include 8,123 problematic, 8,113 highly sensitive, and 515 most sensitive stations. Meanwhile, for gram panchayats, it will arrange 1,12,720 polling stations, with 19,774 problematic, 21,093 highly sensitive, and 2,324 most sensitive centres.

Officials have also listed staff requirements. For the MPTC and ZPTC polls, the Commission will deploy 651 ROs, 2,337 AROs, 2,340 assistant ROs, 39,533 presiding officers, and 1,58,725 other staff. For gram panchayats, it will engage 4,956 ROs in the first phase, 14,407 ROs in the second phase, 79,798 presiding officers, and 1,03,318 other staff.

Ballot boxes and phased polling

The Commission estimated 37,652 ballot boxes for MPTC and ZPTC elections and 1,35,264 for gram panchayats. Officials have readied 1,18,547 of them.

The first phase of gram panchayat polls will cover 41 mandals, 1,098 villages and 9,324 wards. The second phase will include 272 mandals, 5,910 villages and 52,190 wards. The third phase will extend to 252 mandals across 5,752 villages and 51,020 wards.

In parallel, the first phase of MPTC and ZPTC polls will cover 290 ZPTCs and 2,977 MPTCs. The second phase will include 275 ZPTCs and 2,786 MPTCs.