GHMC Elections 2020: Politicos stumped!

Hyderabad: The high-decibel campaign by all political parties, accusations, counter accusations, accusing the Centre of not helping the State, allegations that the State had failed to fulfil its promises does not seem to have cut any ice with the voters under the GHMC limits resulting in the lowest ever percentage of polling. This has sent chills down the spine of all parties.

Though some leaders have been trying to justify low polling saying that it could be due to fear of the spread of Covid, that certainly is not the reason. People have been moving around freely in the city on normal days. Huge crowds were seen during the campaign of all parties. If they did not fear corona, then how could it scare them on Monday is what the leaders of various parties are wondering.

Analysts say that this has exposed the political parties once again as the crowds apparently were hired. Secondly, if voters feared the spread of coronavirus, then why did senior citizens come out in large numbers while the educated sections and youth shy away.

Talking to The Hans India, many citizens said that one of the main reasons was that no proper door-to-door enumeration of voters' list was done and many of them who had voted in the 2019 Assembly elections did not find their names in the list. In many areas, the GHMC officials did not even bother to distribute voters' slips.

Though the Government issued an order that all government and private offices would remain closed on polling day, the software companies did not declare it as holiday and hence the techies who are in work from home mode could not go out and vote.

In fact, some techies were not even aware who was the candidate from the ruling party or the opposition in their wards. In the past, party activists used to visit homes and distribute leaflets explaining who the candidate was and seek votes.

This time nothing of that sort had taken place and residents of the most of the gated communities feigned ignorance about the name of the candidate. If they are not bothered to come to us even for seeking votes why should we go and vote and for them, was the question many asked.