‘Truck took away votes meant for TRS car’

HYDERABAD: It may have been a case of mistaken identity of election symbols that probably led to the defeats of TRS candidates Vemula Veeresham from Nakrekel in Nalgonda district and Tummala Nageswar Rao, a minister, from Palair in Khammam district.

In several constituencies, the truck symbol allotted to Samajwadi Forward Bloc candidates or independents created problems for TRS as many voters got confused with the ‘car’ symbol allotted to the pink party. This confusion led to TRS victory margins dropping by 5,000 to 10,000 votes in some cases and defeats in a few others.

Analysis of votes polled for the truck symbol by TRS revealed that thousands of voters, particularly pensioners and uneducated, voted for the ‘truck’ as it appeared similar to TRS’s car symbol.


An associate of Nageswar Rao told TOI, “Apart from backstabbing by TRS leaders, one of the independents, who is a TRS rebel, contested on the truck symbol. He secured 6,101 votes although he did not campaign much. The reason for this is that voters mistook the truck symbol for the car as it was just two places down on the ballot paper affixed to the EVM.”