Dear Hyderabadis, Please Don’t Repeat 2016!

In a few more hours, the Greater Hyderabad municipal polls will be underway and the Telangana SEC has made all the arrangements for it. 22,000 police force are put in place for the security purpose and the ballots are ready too. Like never before these elections have gained a huge political significance.

But the only concern here is the people of Hyderabad should not repeat the 2016 polls. In the first GHMC elections after the separate statehood was achieved, the polling percentage reported is just 45.27. As it was a public holiday, the Hyderabadis took a break from their busy life and spent the day roaming around the city, visiting the places and shopping in the malls. In fact this surprised many and Tollywood director Koratala Siva who makes social sensible films was deeply disappointed and expressed his anguish on Twitter.

Will the polling percentage improve this time? The situation appears that it might increase as there are a couple of reasons. First is the Hyderabad floods and people who are affected by the floods are in anger that they did not receive the state government and the other thing is due to polls, the registration for flood relief was halted. They are upset with the ruling party as well and are waiting for the right time to show their fury.

The second is even though tomorrow is also a public holiday, people may not do like of 2016 because of the pandemic influence. Still hundreds of cases are reported in the twin cities daily and people are well aware of the fact that the pandemic impact hasn’t come down in the city.

The third would be the emergence of BJP as a strong force. The saffron party has taken the elections very seriously and so even Delhi leaders campaigned here. After the super victory in Dubbaka by-poll, they want to give yet another strong fight and so have picked the GHMC polls. They campaigned extensively amassing a huge public and the BJP leaders left no stone unturned.

Since Monday morning many intellectuals have been appealing to the Hyderabadis to exercise their right to vote in order to increase the polling percent and not to repeat the trend of 2016.