It's poll war now: Nomination phase ends for Nov 30 Assembly battle

Hyderabad: Friday proved to be a day of last-minute changes of candidates by some political parties, leading to protests, defections, high dramas at certain places and confusion on the last day of filing of nominations.

According to preliminary estimates, about 2,000 nominations were received from across the state by returning officers. Gajwel, the constituency, which had become the cynosure of all eyes, received the highest number of nominations (50) followed by Medchal constituency (30) represented by state Labour and Employment Minister Ch Malla Reddy. The Congress party released its final list of candidates making some changes to the earlier list denying tickets to some prominent leaders, including Patel Ramesh Reddy in Suryapet.

A video of Patel Ramesh Reddy crying with family members after being denied a ticket went viral on the social media. He reportedly said that he was very angry and preferred to stay home. Another prominent leader who was denied a ticket is Neelam Madhu of the Patancheru Assembly constituency.

At the eleventh hour, his name was changed and Srinivas Gaur was given the B form. Madhu expressed his displeasure and joined the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and filed nomination.

The Election Commission authorities told Hans India that the exact number of nominations filed would be known past midnight as the returning authorities were in the process of counting the number of nominations filed. They said it is estimated that more than 2,000 candidates had submitted nomination papers. On Friday alone, more than 500 nominations were filed. TPCC president A Revanth Reddy, accompanied by Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and other top Telangana Congress leaders, filed the papers in Kamareddy on Friday. Reddy was pitted against KCR in the constituency.

The BJP replaced party candidate Tula Uma in Vemulawada constituency with Ch Vikas Rao in the eleventh hour. Vikas hurriedly filed the nomination this afternoon. BJP candidate Rajeshwar Deshpande was replaced with P Raju in the Sangareddy Assembly segment and the latter was asked to file the nomination. The saffron party does not even have the profile details of some of the candidates it had fielded. The scrutiny of the nomination papers will take place on November 13 and the last date to withdraw the nomination is November 15.