Poor voter turnout in Anantapur, Kurnool districts

Polling was largely peaceful in Tadipatri where Sec. 144 was imposed

Despite Collectors urging people to vote, voters in Anantapur and Kurnool Municipal Corporations showed the least interest in casting their vote in the elections on Wednesday with only 56.41% showing up at polling booths in Anantapur and 49.33% in Kurnool.

However, people in Madakasira municipality came out in large numbers registering 81.41% polling, while Gudur Nagar panchayat and Nandikotkur municipality registered 86% and 82.52% respectively.

On a side note, elections to urban body polls in Anantapur and Kurnool districts was peaceful except for some minor complaints from the opposition parties and skirmishes at a couple of places.

District Collectors Gandham Chandrudu and G. Veerapandian at separate press conferences thanked the people and the police department for successfully completing a peaceful election. Out of 8,34,409 voters in 337 wards where voting took place, 5,51,726 cast their vote registering 66.12% in Anantapur district. In the 9 ULBs of Kurnool district, 4,82,676 out of 8,58,610 persons cast their votes out of voters registering a 56.22% turnout.

Police personnel disbursed a large gathering of people close to some polling stations in Ramnagar (wards 37 and 38) of Anantapur. In Tadipatri, where restrictions under Section 144 were imposed, no incident was reported till 7 p.m. Police personnel led by B. Satya Yesu Babu and Fakkeerappa Kaginelli kept a close watch on the movement of people to thwart any untoward incident in both the districts.

Anantapur MP Talari Rangaiah was seen casting his vote in ward number 50 in Anantapur at 9.30 a.m. and the Communist Party of India (Marxist) candidates in wards 1, 49, and 50 too cast their votes in the first half an hour.

Transgenders cast their votes in a group at the ward number 6 in Nandyal Municipality in Kurnool district. Joint Collector S. Ramsundar inspected polling booths in Kurnool.

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