YSRC sweeps MPTC and ZPTC polls in Andhra Pradesh
Amaravati, Sep 19: The ruling YSR Congress made a clean sweep of the mandal and zilla parishads elections in Andhra Pradesh, routing the opposition Telugu Desam Party in almost all of the 13 districts.
Till 7.30 PM on Sunday, the YSRC bagged 385 out of 515 zilla parishad territorial constituencies and 5,565 of the 7,221 mandal parishad territorial constituencies for which elections were conducted on April 8.
The TDP 'boycotted' the elections but technically its candidates remained in the fray as the ballots were printed before the party announced its decision.
The election process for the MPTCs and ZPTCs, the second and the third tiers of the Panchayat Raj system began in March 2020 but the Covid-19 pandemic and the subsequent legal battles stretched it this far.
There are a total of 659 ZPTCs of which the ruling party bagged 126 unanimously.
It also won 2,271 MPTCs unopposed. The TDP won 100 MPTCs unanimously.
Eleven unanimous winners in ZPTCs and 81 in MPTCs died since March 2020 even before the poll process ended. Elections in eight ZPTCs and 355 MPTCs were withheld for different reasons.
TDP president N Chandrababu Naidu faced humiliation as the YSRC won all the four ZPTC seats in Kuppam Assembly constituency represented by him. Also, the YSRC clinched 17 of the 19 MPTC seats in Kuppam.
In Chandrababu Naidu's native village Naravaripalli, too, the ruling party won the MPTC seat by a margin of 1,000 votes.
In Chittoor district, the TDP chief's native, the YSRC clinched all the 33 ZPTCs for which elections were held. It had also won the remaining 32 but two of the winners subsequently died.
Same was the case in SPS Nellore, Anantapuramu, Krishna, Prakasam, Vizianagaram and Kurnool districts where the YSRC held its sway.
Overall, the TDP managed to win only four ZPTC seats out of the total 659 while the CPI(M) managed one so far.
In the MPTCs, the TDP bagged 733, Jana Sena 110, BJP 24, CPI(M) 15 and CPI eight. Interestingly, the Congress managed to win four MPTCs two in Visakhapatnam district and one each in East Godavari and SPS Nellore.
Independents have so far won 145 MPTC seats, according to information released by the Information and Public Relations Department.
Meanwhile, the State Election Commission issued a notification fixing September 24 as the date for the indirect election (by the elected members) of the president and vice-president of the mandal parishads.
The chairperson and vice-chairperson of the zilla parishads will be elected on the September 25.
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Woman, 2 sons found dead in Delhi home; suicide suspected
New Delhi (PTI): Three members of a family were found dead inside their home in southeast Delhi's Kalkaji on Friday, with police suspecting it to be a case of suicide, officials said.
Police said the incident came to light around 2.47 pm when a police team reached the premises to execute a court order related to possession of the property. When repeated knocks went unanswered, the staff used a duplicate key to open the door.
Inside, officers found Anuradha Kapoor (52) and her sons, Ashish Kapoor (32) and Chaitanya Kapoor (27), hanging from the ceiling, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Southeast) Hemant Tiwari said in a statement. All three were declared dead.
A handwritten note was recovered from the room, suggesting the family had been struggling with depression.
"The handwritten note indicates emotional distress faced by the family due to which the family may have taken the extreme step," the officer said.
The bodies have been shifted to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) mortuary for post-mortem and other legal formalities under Section 194 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), police said.
Residents of the neighbourhood said they were shocked to learn about the deaths, adding that the family kept largely to themselves.
Pankaj Kashyap, a resident of Girinagar, said he learnt about the deaths while leaving for work. "I live and work here and was leaving for work when I saw many people standing outside and talking. That is how I got to know that three people had committed suicide. I also saw several police vehicles outside, but I do not know much beyond that," he said.
Baldev, another neighbour, said the family had been living in the newly constructed house for around two years. "We only knew that a mother and her two children lived there. They had moved into the newly built house around two years ago. We did not interact much with them. Today we heard that all three have committed suicide, and whatever we know is based on what people here are saying," he said.
Another neighbour, Ramesh Kumar, claimed the family had earlier attempted suicide.
"About fifteen to twenty days ago, the two sons in the family had attempted suicide and police and ambulances had come. That was when I first got to know who they were. I do not recognise them by face, but we saw the ambulances and police take the two sons that day. Today again we saw ambulances and police arriving, so everyone came out to see what had happened. I do not know how long they had been living here, but this is all we know," he said.
Police said they are examining the family's financial condition, social circumstances, and other factors that may have contributed to the incident. Further investigation is underway.
