Telangana graduates must re-enrol for MLC polls by Nov 6: CEO

The draft rolls will be published on November 25, with claims and objections accepted till December 10.

Hyderabad: Graduates in two of Telangana’s three graduates’ constituencies have until November 6 to enrol as voters for the Legislative Council elections due early next year and even those already on the rolls are not exempt, election officials said on Monday, October 26.

The electoral rolls for the Mahabubnagar-Rangareddy-Hyderabad and Warangal-Khammam-Nalgonda Graduates’ constituencies are being prepared from scratch. Every voter, including those who voted in earlier council polls, will have to apply again in Form-18, according to the frequently asked questions (FAQ) issued by the State Election Commission (SEC).

The terms of the sitting MLCs from the two seats, Surabhi Vani Devi and Teenmar Mallanna, end on March 29, 2027.

Under the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, a fresh roll has to be prepared each time elections are held to these seats. “The details in the old voter list will not be considered,” the FAQ said, adding that applications without proof of the degree will be rejected.

Who can apply

With November 1 fixed as the qualifying date, only those who passed a degree or equivalent examination on or before November 1, 2023, and who live within the constituency, are eligible. Those with higher qualifications can also apply.

The date of passing on the marks memo or provisional certificate is what counts, not the convocation date. A person who cleared the degree in July 2024, for instance, cannot register this time.

Graduates in the erstwhile Medak, Nizamabad, Adilabad and Karimnagar districts need not apply, as their constituency went to the polls in 2025.

Applications can be filed online at ceotelangana.nic.in or submitted to the Electoral Registration Officer (ERO) or Assistant Electoral Registration Officer (AERO) in person or by post. Plain-paper applications will not be accepted.

Applicants have to produce the original certificate before the designated officer for verification or attach a copy attested by a gazetted officer. Those whose certificates are held by an employer, university or other similar bodies may submit certified extracts from those records instead.

Giving Aadhaar details is optional and the first eight digits will be masked in the published roll. Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) C Sudarshan Reddy has said the EPIC number is not mandatory either.

A voter can be registered in only one graduates’ constituency and at only one place within it, officials said.

Slow response so far

The draft rolls will be published on November 25, with claims and objections accepted till December 10. These will be disposed of by December 25 and the final rolls, in Telugu and English, published on December 30.

Enrolment has been sluggish. About 3.55 lakh applications had come in by October 15 across both seats, against 10.36 lakh voters on the 2021 rolls, according to figures from the CEO’s office. Warangal-Khammam-Nalgonda accounted for about 2.02 lakh of them.

Parties have stepped up efforts to get their supporters on the rolls. The ruling Congress, which has named Sama Rammohan Reddy and Ramreddy Sarvotham Reddy as its candidates for the two seats, has appointed observers to oversee enrolment, while the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has urged graduates to re-register.

Mallanna won the Warangal-Khammam-Nalgonda seat in a 2024 bypoll held after Palla Rajeshwar Reddy resigned on being elected MLA.

Telangana’s 40-member Legislative Council has three seats elected by graduates. Members serve six-year terms, with one-third retiring every two years.