Tirupati segment has least electorate

Tirupati: Chittoor district election officers had a major task of reaching electoral population ratio, which is far less than the prescribed figure. As per the Election Commission of India estimates, every constituency should have 65-70 per cent of voters among the total population in any constituency.

As per the requirement, the district should have 31.24 lakh voters in 14 constituencies as per 2019 population estimates whereas the draft voters list reveals that there were only 28.94 lakh voters leaving a gap of 2.29 lakh voters. Tirupati constituency has only 2.19 lakh voters out of 4.58 lakh population which accounts for 47.7 per cent. It means the constituency is in shortage of one lakh voters.

Out of 14 constituencies, only four have more than the prescribed number of voters. They are Tamballapalle, Pileru, Punganuru and Puthalapattu while all the remaining 10 segments have lesser number of voters and among these Tirupati tops the list with more than one lakh voters are to be enrolled followed by Madanapalle with 32,337, Palamaneru (26,849), Kuppam (21,535) and Chandragiri (14,000).

To fill these huge gaps, the officials have planned to take every opportunity to bring awareness among people and get them enrolled. Speaking to The Hans India, Joint Collector PS Girisha said that due to intensive revision of voters list in November 2017, several voters were deleted as they were not found in their respective addresses. They might have shifted to nearby mandals which may fall in other constituencies or to some other address in the same constituency. When they were not traced, naturally their names will be deleted after house to house verification.

Another reason for fall in electoral population ratio especially in Tirupati was that it has several universities and educational institutions of national repute. Students might have enrolled when they were studying here and moved to other places after their education. Due to all these reasons, the ratio was less.

“All the voters have to check the voters list immediately which they can find at Tahsildars offices, BLOs, Mee Seva Kendras or they can simply do so online. If their names were not found in the list, they have to fill Form-VI and submit it to get enrolled,” JC explained. Special focus was laid on Tirupati and Madanapalle for the purpose, he said.

As part of this, a huge rally was held in Tirupati on Wednesday from Town Club Circle to Indira Grounds. Speaking on the occasion, RDO G Narasimhulu called upon the youth to enrol themselves as voters immediately. Everyone born before December 2000 will be eligible to become voters.

In democracy, everyone has the right to exercise their franchise in elections and to do so they should first enrol in voters list, he said. Referring to least percentage of voters in Tirupati, he appealed to all eligible citizens to enrol themselves either through online or by visiting Tahsildar office before October 31.

Urban Tahsildar Chandramohan, Municipal Corporation Assistant Commissioner Phani Ram, Chamber of Commerce President A Manjunath, Consumer Forum President K Raja Reddy, various voluntary organisations, NSS, NCC candidates took part in the rally.