Hyderabad:
Around 67 per cent polling was registered in the crucial bypolls to seven Assembly constituencies in Andhra Pradesh that went off peacefully on Sunday, election officials said.
"The polling was peaceful in the seven constituencies without any major law and order incident and 67 per cent voting was recorded," State Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Bhanwar Lal told reporters here.
Six of these constituencies -- Kollapur, Nagarkurnool, Mahabubnagar, Kamareddy, Adilabad and Station Ghanpur -- are in Telangana region, while the seventh, Kovur, is in coastal Andhra.
The counting of votes will be taken up on March 21 The by-elections to five of these constituencies were necessitated by the resignations of sitting MLAs in support of the separate Telangana demand. At Mahabubnagar, the sitting MLA died, while in Kovur, the sitting TDP MLA quit in support of Kadapa MP Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy.
Though Jagan's YSR Congress is contesting only in Kovur, the election is crucial for him as this is his first electoral battle outside his family bastion of Kadapa district.
A victory in Kovur is a must for Jagan ahead of the bypolls to 17 other Assembly constituencies, the notification of which is expected to be announced soon.
The bypolls in 16 of these constituencies have been necessitated after the sitting Congress MLAs were disqualified by Assembly Speaker for violating party whip by voting against the government during a TDP-sponsored no-confidence motion in December.
While disqualifying the 16 MLAs, the Speaker also accepted the resignation of one MLA of erstwhile Praja Rajyam who shifted loyalty to Jagan.