Second phase of AP Panchayat polls underway

Amaravati(AP): Polling for the second phase of gram panchayat elections in Andhra Pradesh to elect 2,786 ward members began on Saturday, officials said.

Voting commenced at 6.30 am and will conclude at 3.30 pm while counting of votes will start at 4 pm, they said.

Panchayat polls in the state began on February 9 and will go on till February 21 in four phases.

Elections will be held to elect 20,817 ward members.

Though the elections were to be held for 3,328 panchayat sarpanchs, 539 have been unanimously elected while no nominations were filed



forthreevillages, an official release said on Friday.

As many as 7507 candidates are contesting for sarpanch posts and 44.876 are in fray for ward members.

The elections are held using ballot paper and without any political party symbols.

A total of 29,304 polling stations were set up, out of which 5480 have been identified as sensitive and 4181 as hypersensitive.

All necessary precautions are in place as per COVID-19 protocols amid tight security and PPE kits will be provided to infected voters.