Chandrababu Naidu demands fresh poll for Nellore civic body

Mangalagiri: TDP national president N Chandrababu Naidu on Monday demanded that the State Election Commissioner (SEC) order cancellation of the election to the Nellore Municipal Corporation (NMC) due to poll irregularities and deliberate manipulation of final lists of contesting candidates.

He urged the SEC to order fresh elections to the NMC in order to protect democracy and win over the confidence of the people in the election process. The election officials committed a breach of election conduct by causing inordinate delay in releasing final lists of contestants after conclusion of withdrawal of nominations at 3 pm. Addressing a virtual press conference, the TDP chief said there was a conspiracy to use forged signatures to announce voluntary withdrawal of opponents of the ruling YSRCP. Some unscrupulous officials were conniving with the YSRCP leaders. The election officers were surrendering to the ruling party goondas and rowdies without doing their duty in a transparent manner. Naidu strongly objected to some election officials rushing to give unanimous declaration forms in 8 wards while the final lists were not yet published.

The TDP chief said the withdrawal of nominations concluded at 3 pm but the final lists were not released even by 7 pm. The YSRCP Nellore leaders were behaving like anti-social elements by obstructing and undermining the election process indiscriminately, he said.