Elections 2024: Bus stations, toll plazas witness rush as voters head home to exercise franchise in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana

Hyderabad/Amaravati: A significant surge in people heading back to their hometowns to cast their votes on May 13 is being witnessed at bus terminals, train stations, and toll booths on Sunday.

Hyderabad is home to a large chunk of people from Andhra Pradesh and rural areas of Telangana.

From May 8 to 12, in addition to the regular services, 1,683 additional and 1,048 special services have been deployed totaling 2,731 from various places in Andhra Pradesh, the State-owned Road transport Corporation said in a press release.

All the scheduled bus services from Hyderabad, Bengaluru and Chennai were full of pre-reservations, it said.

Similarly, the corporation also made arrangements to ferry the passengers back after the voting, the RTC said.

A Telangana State Road Transport Corporation official said they are running an additional 2,000 services from Hyderabad to facilitate voters to reach their destinations.

The South-Central Railway said in order to cater to the rush it has temporarily augmented some trains with additional coaches.

Online bus ticketing platform redBus has said it forecasts a 47 per cent increase in intercity bus bookings on the weekend in poll-bound Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, before the May 13 elections, compared to the previous weekend.

Polling for the 17 Lok Sabha seats in Telangana and 25 Parliamentary constituencies in Andhra Pradesh besides the 175-member Assembly will take place on Monday.