Hyderabad, April 10: Notwithstanding the claims of the chief electoral officer that the Kadapa byelections were conducted in the most democratic manner, the Election Watch Andhra Pradesh on Monday alleged that the local leaders of various political parties in many villages managed to enjoy their control at polling stations despite various preventive measures taken by the Election Commission. However, it admitted that there was not much ‘rigging’ this time.
In a statement here on Monday, the Election Watch-AP state conveners S Srinivas Reddy and V Lakshmana Reddy, and Kadapa district coordinator K Shankar Reddy said local leaders of major political parties managed to oust the polling agents of rival parties from polling stations and managed to have ‘one-sided polling’.
According to them, such incidents occurred in the Assembly segments of Kamalapuram, Proddatur and Jammalamadugu.
The Election Watch also criticised the officials for poor arrangements made for the polling. “The webcameras did not function in about three-fourths of the stations due to lack of power supply, Internet, servers and experienced operators of webcameras.’’
“Local leaders supplied food and water to polling staff though it was the duty of the Election Commission. More than Rs 300 crore was spent by the major political parties during the entire campaigning’’
At the same time, the Election Watch representatives admitted that the by-elections were held in circumstances far better than in the past.
Due to the presence of a large number of policemen and the triangular contest, the polls were held in a peaceful manner.
–Agencies