State Election Commissioner Nimmagadda Ramesh Kumar seems to be a changed man, after his visit to Raj Bhavan, last week.
He had been against the unanimous elections ever since he resumed the elections early this year.
Nimmagadda had even repeatedly spoken against the unanimous elections whenever he had the opportunity.
He had even issued a notice to the Information and Public Relations Commissioner for issuing an advertisement on behalf of the government encouraging unanimous elections.
But, minutes after his visit, Nimmagadda had cleared the unanimous elections in Guntur and Chittoor districts, which he kept in abeyance earlier.
Now, as the second phase of the election process started, Nimmagadda himself had declared the unanimous elections.
The SEC said a total of 539 panchayats had unanimous elections of which Guntur topped the list with 70 panchayats followed by Prakasam with 69 and Chittoor with 62.
The second phase would see elections to 3,328 gram panchayats of which 539 were unanimous.
Elections would be held to 2,786 gram panchayats on February 13, in the second phase.
