Hyderabad, Oct 8 (IANS) The Congress on Wednesday announced Naveen Yadav as its candidate for by-election to Jubilee Hills Assembly seat, scheduled to be held on November 11.

All India Congress Committee (AICC) president Mallikarjun Kharge approved the candidature of Naveen Yadav, AICC general secretary K. C. Venugopal said in a statement on Wednesday.

As per the schedule announced by the Election Commission of India on Monday, the official notification for the by-election will be issued on October 13, while the last date for filing nominations is October 21.

Scrutiny of nominations will be held on October 22, and withdrawal of candidature will be allowed until October 24.

Counting of votes will take place on November 14, and the election process will be completed by November 16, 2025.

The vacancy is caused by the death of sitting MLA Maganti Gopinath of the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) in June.

As per the final electoral roll published last week, the constituency has 3,99,000 voters — 2,07,382 males, 1,91,593 females and 25 third-gender voters.

In the 2023 Assembly elections, the constituency had 3,85,287 voters.

Thus, there has been an increase of 3.49 per cent voters.

Polling for the by-election will be held across 407 polling stations in 139 locations within the constituency.

In the 2023 elections, Gopinath of BRS had scored a hat-trick by defeating former Indian cricket captain and Congress candidate Mohammed Azharuddin by 16,337 votes.

In a multi-cornered contest, Gopinath had secured 80,549 votes while Azharuddin had polled 64,212 votes.

BJP’s L. Deepak Reddy was at third position with 25,866 votes. All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) headed by Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi had also fielded its candidate but he finished poor fourth with just 7,848 votes.

BRS has announced Gopinath’s wife Maganti Sunitha as its candidate. The BJP has not yet announced its candidate.

–IANS

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