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The Election Commission has asked the Andhra Pradesh authorities to step up surveillance efforts to check the use of cash in elections during the Phase II polls being held on May 7 in 13 districts of the Seemandhra region.
The EC was worried over the scale of secretive supply of cash that was allegedly meant to influence the voters in Andhra Pradesh, state chief electoral officer Bhanwar Lal said on Saturday.
The police in AP had seized Rs 140 crore in cash and most of it was done during vehicle searches. The EC was baffled by the fact that the volume of cash seized in AP accounts for over 50 per cent of the total cash seized in the entire country.
"The CEC is worried. Yesterday, they asked us to double the number of flying squads," Bhanwar Lal told reporters. The total cash seized in the ongoing election process in India was Rs 270 crore of which over 50 per cent came from just AP.
Besides, about 74.2 kilogram of gold, close to one tonne silver and around 500,000 litre liquor had been seized by the police so far, according to the CEO.
There are about 36.8 million voters in Seemandhra, which has 25 Lok Sabha and 175 Assembly constituencies. The authorities have set up over 40,000 polling stations. There are 333 contesting candidates for Lok Sabha and 2,243 candidates for Assembly seats.
2 per cent rise in voting in Phase 1
Meanwhile, the election authorities on Saturday released the final polling percentages in all 10 districts of Telangana. According to it, the polling was up just 2 per cent this time compared with the 2009 elections.
According to the CEC data, the total percentage of voting recorded in Telangana districts on April 30 was 70.85 per cent compared with 68. 71 per cent recorded in the 2009 elections.
The three parliamentary constituencies located in the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) limits, namely Hyderabad, Secunderabad and Malkajgiri, proved a drag on the overall poll percentage as they recorded 52.52 per cent, 53.28 per cent and 51.19 per cent polling respectively.
The only other constituency with a relatively lower turnout was Chevella, which touched just over 60 per cent in polling. Compared with last year's statistics, the polling percentage was marginally down in Malkajgiri, Secunderabad and Chevella parliamentary constituencies. In the remaining 13 parliamentary constituencies, the turnout stood in the range of 71-81 per cent.
