Nizamabad: Polling for the graduates and teachers MLC elections in the Karimnagar-Adilabad-Nizamabad-Medak constituencies proceeded peacefully on Thursday, with voting starting at 8 am and ending at 4 pm. Voters in line at closing were still allowed to cast their ballots.
In Nizamabad district, 24,242 of 31,574 graduate voters (76.78 per cent) and 3,468 of 3,751 teacher voters (92.46 per cent) exercised their franchise. Teachers were allowed to vote twice — once as graduates and once as teachers — with some casting their ballots at common polling booths while others voted separately. School assistant Jaya Laxmi from Jalalpur village described the experience as “thrilling” after casting her two votes at SFS and CSI schools.
District collector Rajiv Gandhi Hanumanthu also voted at an SFS school in Nizamabad and monitored polling via webcasting from his district office. Once polling concluded, ballot boxes were transported by RTC buses to the reception centre in Karimnagar.
In Kamareddy district, initial polling percentages were low, with graduates at 5.5 per cent and teachers at 7.66 per cent. By the end of the day, 12,820 of 16,410 graduate voters (78.12 per cent) and 1,883 of 2,011 teacher voters (93.63 per cent) had cast their ballots. District collector Ashish Sangwan voted and reviewed polling trends in the district.
Meanwhile, some private teachers reported disappointment after discovering their names had been removed from the voter list. Following complaints from PRTU leaders, tahsildars reviewed enrollments and clarified that some private teachers had intentionally opted out of the teacher MLC voter list.
