Munugode by-poll: CEO rubbishes BJP's counting delay allegations; says process taking time because of candidates

Dismissing BJP's counting delay allegations, Telangana Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Vikas Raj said the process is taking time because of the high number of candidates.

There are around 47 candidates in the fray for the Munugode by-poll. Of whom, nearly three dozen are independents.

The CEO stated that the counting is progressing smoothly and that various officials oversee the process.

He was replying to the allegations raised by BJP state president Bandi Sanjay Kumar. Bandi Sanjay alleged that the state chief electoral officer's attitude is suspicious.

Sanjay asked why the CEO was dragging his feet in uploading the results when BJP took the lead. He alleged that "results are uploaded round-wise when TRS is leading."

He claimed there was an unprecedented delay in declaring the results. "If there is any slip-up in the election results, we will complain to the Central Election Commission," he warned.

Till round 11, TRS was leading by 5801 votes. The margin between the number of votes secured by TRS and BJP has been increasing.

BJP has secured 68776 votes while TRS has secured 74577 votes.

Earlier, the CEO said three-layered security had been provided at the counting centers. The inner core area is manned by Central forces while the outer two layers are looked after by the state police.

Four more rounds of counting to go

Munugode by-election recorded a high voter turnout of 93.13 percent on Thursday.

Polling reportedly continued after 6 pm in some of the polling stations. According to the election commission, the last EVM ballot was cast at 1:30 am on Friday.

Around 2,25,192 votes were cast in the constituency. Of whom 1,13,853 men and 1,11,338 women and one transgender cast their votes.

The voting was held at 298 polling stations. Most of the polling stations witnessed voter turnout beyond 90%. The highest voter turnout of 98.21% was recorded at Jakkalavarigudem polling station followed by Munugode polling station (98.15%) and Tupran Peta polling station (97.83%).