More than 2,000 candidates have entered the fray for the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) elections as the process of filing nomination papers ended on Sunday.
Many candidates went with big processions and bands to the GHMC office to file their nomination papers. The nominations will be scrutinised today and January 21 will the be the last day to withdraw the nominations.
While TDP and the BJP as part of an alliance, have divided the seats with former contesting 90 and the latter getting 60 seats, the main Opposition Congress party was contesting all the 150 seats.
Ruling Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS), which was treating the civic polls as battle of prestige was contesting all the 150 seats. Its prominent candidate include Vijayalakshmi, daughter of senior party leader K Keshav Rao and Vijaya Reddy, daughter of late Congress leader P Janardhan Reddy.
Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM), which was in power in the city corporation till it was dissolved, is contesting in almost half of the seats. The party was likely to have an unofficial understanding with the TRS.
Distribution of tickets has led to a lot of bickering in all the major parties with a section of Congress workers staging a protest at the party head office. They were angry with allocation of the ticket to a leader who had earlier defected to the YSR Congress party.