Munugode By-Poll: One Of The Most Monitored Elections In Telangana

A voting percentage of 11.2 % was recorded in the 1st 2 hours of the Munugode by-poll, officially becoming one the most monitored in Telangana and perhaps in India.

Vikas Raj, CEO, of Telangana, in an interview with a national TV, said arrangements were in place for non-stop monitoring of the polling in Munugode. CCTVs are installed all over the constituency, and webcasting is arranged from every polling booth, with officials keeping a watch from the district, State, and Central levels.

With accusations of the election campaign being one of the costliest in the country and several cash seizures, he said a record number of teams were deployed to control these issues.

As of Wednesday, Rs.8.02 crore was seized, including cash, gold, and even saris, while 3 was a seizure of 5000 liters of liquor. Over the last 1 month, 111 belt shops were closed, with 128 officials deployed exclusively to arrest liquor flow.

Reports were there of digital payments, but the Commission’s intelligence has not said that Vikas Raj said, adding that there were over 500 complaints over the last month, all of which were enquired into. There were 51 teams for that purpose alone, while Revenue and police teams with cameras controlled from a central control room were still on the job.

There were 185 cases booked based on complaints, while 90 persons have been arrested.

Compared to other elections, Vikas Raj said multiple measures were introduced for Munugode, with the number of model code of conduct monitoring teams being 14 as against the usual three. There were 14 flying squads, 14 as against the norm of 3, while there were two election expenditure observers, seven officers from the IT dept, and a GST team.