There are 157 voters who will be exercising their franchise in the election to the A.P. Legislative Council for the Hyderabad Local Authorities constituency today at the GHMC head office.
Apart from the 100 corporators of GHMC whose divisions come under the Hyderabad district, there are 49 ex-officio members like Lok Sabha (2) and Rajya Sabha (11) members, 15 MLAs along with the eight Cantonment Board civilian members who are eligible to vote for the two MLC seats available.
Three candidates are in the fray – M.S. Prabhakar (Congress), Y. Mallesam (TD) and Syed Amin Jafri (MIM). However, the ballot paper will have only names and not have any party symbols or any serial numbers. Voters can give their first and second preferential votes in the space prescribed, explained a senior official.
Order of names in the ballot paper will be as per the Telugu alphabets, ignoring the initials.
Election officials have already conducted training classes for the voters.
Polling will be held from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. and two polling stations – one in the ‘Face to Face' hall for the ex-officio members and another inside the Library hall for the corporators have been arranged.
All the eligible voters will be allowed to vote only if they carry an identity card which could be those issued by the Parliament, State Legislative Assembly, GHMC or their very own elector photo identity card issued by the Election Commission of India.
Ballot papers will be mixed from the two polling stations and bundled into 25 each for taking up counting scheduled to be held on May 10.
Two of the three candidates getting the magic mark of 53 votes will be declared winner and he will be a member of the Legislative Council for six years.
Prohibitory orders have been issued near the office and no vehicles are being allowed from the South gate adjacent to the B.R.R. building. Car parking for voters is arranged at the Lumbini Park while the municipal staff can enter the office through the gate on the Liberty road.
