Voters belonging to Telangana and Maharashtra border villages vote in both state elections

In democracy, people use their right to vote, but voters in the border villages of Telangana and Maharashtra have been voting in both the state elections. Read why they have been doing so...

Asifabad (Telangana): In a rare phenomenon, voters belonging to Telangana and Maharashtra border villages have been exercising their franchise in elections being conducted in both the states. The people of 12 villages on the border of Telangana and Maharashtra are voting in the Assembly and Lok Sabha elections held in the two states. Each family in this area has two ration cards, drawing pensions from both the state and two voter ID cards. It is noteworthy that there are two state power poles, two schools, two Anganwadi centres and health sub-centres in the villages. As the citizens vote in the elections conducted by two states with two voter cards, they have two Sarpanches, two MLAs, two CMs and two MPs

The land dispute between Maharashtra and United Andhra Pradesh has been pending for the last seven decades. The villages of Parandoli, Kota, Shankarloddi, Lendijala, Mukudanguda, Maharajguda, Antapur, Indranagar, Padmavati, Essapur, Bolapatar and Gauri in Kerameri mandal of United Adilabad (now Kumurabhim) district have been included in Andhra Pradesh during linguistic based reorganisation of states in 1956. These villages have a population of 9,246 and 3,283 voters. Being geographically and culturally close to Maharashtra, in 1987 these villages were included in the Jiviti taluka of Chandrapur district and the Maharashtra government conducted panchayat elections

The entire forest area in this area is under the Kagaznagar division of Kumurabhim district. In this context, both states jointly constituted the KK Naidu Commission to resolve the dispute. Later, the High Court decided that all these areas belong to Andhra Pradesh. Challenging this, Maharashtra approached the Supreme Court and the case is still pending.