After a painstaking two-day countin of about 3.88 lakh ballot papers for Warangal-Khammam-Nalgonda Graduates’ MLC, the final batch counting of first preference votes declared at 6 a.m. on Friday made it clear that second preference vote counting and elimination method is inevitable to arrive at candidate’s majority.
In the sixth batch results at 1 a.m., the three front runners TRS’ Palla Rajeshwar Reddy (16204), Independent Teenmar Mallana (11, 910) and TJS’ M. Kondandaram maintained their streak.
At about 6 a.m., after the final batch count, they stood with 1, 10, 840 votes, 83, 290 votes and 70, 072 votes respectively. BJP candidate Premendar Reddy stood fourth with 39, 10 votes.
In all 21,636 votes were declared invalid.
And clearly, as none of the candidates secured the 50% -mark votes, Returning Officer Prashant J Patil convened a meeting with the candidates and informed of the decision to count the second preference votes.
The process inherently eliminates the low-scoring contestants, while the second preference votes on their ballots will be added to the according continuing candidates to attain majority. The elimination and vote addition continues till the required quota is figured.
The Graduates’ MLC here witnessed 71 contestants in the fray. And for the single seat constituency, as per the quota formula, the minimum votes a candidate has to secure for getting elected, the total valid votes are divided by 2. If any fraction is ignored and added by 1.
Therefore, the valid summary figure at the end of first preference counting 3, 66, 333 is divided by 2 and added by 1, which is 1, 83, 167.
And it can now be concluded, TRS’ Palla Rajeshwar Reddy needs 1, 83, 167 – 1, 10, 840 = 72, 327 votes to be re-elected as the MLC. Similarly, Independent Teenmar Mallana needs 99, 877 and TJS’ M. Kondandaram needs 1, 13, 095 votes to win the poll.
Starting 7.30 a.m., the second preference vote counting has been in progress, and as per reports available till 12 noon, 34 candidates have been eliminated, and their according second votes, 107, 103 and 97 votes, were added to the respective front runners.
The process, elimination and transferability of votes in the preferential vote counting mode, may continue several rounds, and even till the fight turns between the last two potential candidates, till the majority quota is achieved.
