Separate Polls in Telangana and AP under One CEO

VV Balakrishna - HYDERABAD 

Published: 22nd February 2014 09:12 AM

Last Updated: 22nd February 2014 11:17 AM

Election notification for Assembly and Lok Sabha will be issued separately for Telangana and Andhra Pradesh states.
“However, there will be no separate Chief Electoral Officers (CEOs) for the two states. At this point of time, appointing a second CEO is not possible. The present CEO will conduct elections in both the states,” sources in Chief Electoral Office (CEO) said.
The officials attached to the office of the  Chief Electoral Officer here were of the opinion that President Pranab Mukherjee would soon endorse the AP Reorganisation Bill, 2013 which was passed in both Houses of Parliament. “We are expecting that the Gazette notification dividing the state will be issued by Monday,” they said.
Once the gazette notification was issued by the President for a separate Telangana, the elections would be held for two states. “There is no possibility of conducting elections in a unified state,” the sources confirmed.
There would be no problem in conducting the elections with one CEO, the officials said.
All the Assembly and Lok Sabha segments were clearly demarcated with boundaries  and there would be no problem in conducting elections in the two separate states.
There was some confusion before 2008. But, after the delimitation of Assembly and  Lok Sabha segments in 2008, the jurisdictions of Assembly and Lok Sabha seats were in the respective regions only. For example, Bhadrachalam Lok Sabha segment was spread in four districts before 2008, which covered both the Andhra and Telangana regions. Now, there was no such problem.
“There is no overlapping with respect to the Assembly segments. All are separated as per the regions,” the officials said and added that Assembly segment and village-wise data are available.
CEO Bhanwarlal attended a preliminary meeting with Chief Election Commissioner two days back in Delhi. Once the gazette notification was issued, the Commissioner would consult the Union law ministry and issue separate notifications, the officials said. Bhanwarlal may attend another meeting for the conduct of elections in two states some time in March, sources said.