Hyderabad, Oct 23 (IANS) Nominations of 130 candidates in the Jubilee Hills Assembly by-election have been rejected.

The nominations of 81 candidates out of 211 have been accepted, Returning Officer P. Sairam said.

Due to the large number of nominations, the scrutiny continued till late Wednesday night, and an announcement about the number of nominations rejected was made Thursday morning.

Out of 321 sets of nominations, 135 sets were accepted, and the remaining 186 were rejected.

The nominations of the main contestants were found valid.

Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) candidate Maganti Sunitha’s nomination has been accepted. There were allegations by former MLA Maganti Gopinath’s wife, Malini Devi, and their son T. Pradhumna Kosaraju that Sunitha furnished false details in her affidavit. They had urged the Chief Electoral Officer to reject her nomination.

Kosaraju also claimed that Sunitha was in a live-in relationship with his father till his death. He stated that his father, Gopinath’s only legally wedded wife, was his mother, Malini Devi, whom he married on April 28, 1998. As Gopinath did not divorce his mother, Malini Devi, he said the marriage of his parents continues to persist.

BRS leader Gopinath, who had won the Jubilee Hills seat for the third consecutive term in 2023, died in June, necessitating the by-election.

The nominations of Congress candidate Naveen Yadav and BJP’s Lankala Deepak Reddy were also accepted by the Returning Officer.

On Tuesday, the last day of filing of nominations, 117 candidates had filed their nominations, taking the total number to 211.

A large number of candidates, including farmers affected by the Regional Ring Road (RRR) project, residents whose homes were allegedly demolished by HYDRAA, farmers and unemployed youth filed nominations.

These groups entered the fray to register their protest against the government over different issues.

Friday is the last day for withdrawal of candidatures. The polling is scheduled to be held on November 11, while the counting of votes will be taken up on November 14.

In the 2023 elections, he defeated former Indian cricket captain and Congress candidate Mohammed Azharuddin by 16,337 votes to win.

In a multi-cornered contest, Gopinath had secured 80,549 votes while Azharuddin had polled 64,212 votes. Deepak Reddy of the BJP was in third position with 25,866 votes.

All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM), whose candidate finished fourth in the 2023 elections, is not contesting this time. The party led by Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi has declared support for the Congress candidate.

–IANS

ms/svn