GHMC election: Police to keep an eye on troublemakers in city

HYDERABAD: With the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) election fever gradually rising, the Hyderabad police have carried out a study and dentified seven potential trouble spots, where Maj is-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen MIM) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and MIM and Majlis Bachao Tahreek (MBT) activists may clash, in South Zone.
As it is the local body elections, police have done a similar exercise in other zones, taking profiles of contesting candidates and their parties into account.Police would focus on seven localities Uppuguda, Azampura, Puranapul, Jangammet, Shahalibanda, Patharghatti and Dabeerpura in South Zone as these areas had witnessed clashes between rival parties.
As a result, the city police have deployed a large number of forces to prevent any trouble as all parties having started wooing voters and complaints started pouring in about violation of the model code of conduct.
“Efforts are on to link these seven localities with CCTV camera network. Al ready 30 shadow teams were deployed in these areas to look out for trouble-makers,'' deputy commissioner of police (South Zone) V Satyanarayana said. Already , the candidates have started luring voters thro ugh various means and police were receiving complaints on these issues.
In West Zone when a similar exercise was done, police had found that Mangalhat, Asif Nagar, Shahinathgunj and its sur rounding areas might face tough contests and were also communally sensitive.
“Of the 1,325 booths in the West Zone, 127 are declared sensitive and 59 hyper-sensitive. The conclusions are drawn mainly based on the contesting candidates and their stature,'' DCP (West Zone) A Venkateshwara Rao said.
According to police, the binding-over process has started and over 1,000 offenders involved in various cases, trouble-makers during elections including communal clashes, from the city, would be detained in the next two to three days.