It has been not even a month since elections to Telangana state assembly came to an end giving massive mandate to the Telangana Rashtra Samithi and election atmosphere is back in the state.
This time, it is for the much-awaited gram panchayat elections. The Telangana state election commission on Tuesday announced the schedule for elections to 12,732 gram panchayats in the state to be held from January 21 to 30.
With the announcement of schedule for panchayat polls, the model code of conduct came into effect immediately and chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao should not take part in any official programmes and not make any policy announcements. He is likely to be return from his Kaleshwaram trip by tonight.
According to State election commissioner V Nagi Reddy, the elections to gram panchayats will be held in three phases.
In the first phase, elections will be held for 39,832 wards in 4480 gram panchayats on January 21. In the second phase to be held on January 25, 36620 wards will go to polls in 4,137 gram panchayats and in the last phase to be held on January 30, 36718 wards in 4115 gram panchayats will go to polls.
As per the election schedule, the notification for the first phase will be issued on January 7 and the last date for filing of nominations will be January 9. Polling will be held on January 21.
For the second phase, the notification would be issued on January 11 and the last date for filing of nominations will be January 13 and polling will be held on January 25.
For the third phase, the notification will be issued on January 16 and the last date for filing of nominations will be January 18. The polling will be held on January 30.
In all the three phases, polling will be held from 7 am to 1 pm and counting of votes will take place on the same day from 2 pm. Results would be declared after the completion of counting.