Under People’s Front alliance, Telangana Jana Samithi leader Kapilavayi Dilip Kumar contested in the Malkajgiri assembly segment. At the end of the day in Friday’s poll, Dilip found to his utter discomfort that many issues have turned against his candidature. Large numbers of People’s Front sympathisers could not cast their vote in the election because of their missing votes or because of location of polling booths 14 kms to 17 kms away from their place of resident.

When he got the complete data on polling trends, Dilip came to conclusion nearly 50,000 votes were missing from the final voters lists based on which the polling was carried out. In the face of no alternative, he took his complaint to the election authorities and demanded a total re-poll in the entire Malkajgiri segment. He asserted the missing of so many names would have certain impact on the election verdict which was the reason for his new demand.

TJS leaders say because of arbitrary allocation of polling booths far away from residences, many voters did not show interest in taking pains to go all the way to cast their vote which is found to be another embarrassing situation for People’s Front nominee there. Dilip Kumar came out with a fresh demand that the re-poll should be conduct after giving a chance for re-entry of missing names in the voter lists.

The urban segments faced a variety of issues that led to poor turnout of voters. Another reason is also cited as polling coming on Friday, which is clubbed with Saturday and Sunday by many urban residents who went out of city for picnics or personal visits.

G.Ravikiran