HYDERABAD: As the Congress is preparing to disqualify 16 of its MLAs who voted against its government on the no-confidence motion in the Assembly on December 5, by-elections for about 25 Assembly seats in the state will be held in due course. Already, seven seats are vacant in the Assembly.The Telugu Desam, the main opposition party, is considering the by-elections as a ‘wmini-general election’ to test its popularity and prepare itself for the 2014 general election. As such, it has started assessing its electoral prospects. Its think-tank estimates that the party will wrest some seats from the ruling party in the Andhra region and check the surge of YSR Congress chief YS Jaganmohan Reddy. The TDP has been wary of contesting by-elections ever since it lost the recent by-elections by huge margins. It suffered humiliating defeats in the Telangana region last year when by-elections were held for 12 Assembly seats. Initially, party chief N Chandrababu Naidu did not favour the party contest the by-polls which were fought on the Telangana plank but relented at the last minute under pressure from some leaders from the region. Result: All TDP candidates lost their deposits.Later, this year, by-elections were held for the Kadapa Lok Sabha and Pulivendula Assembly seats. Though not sure of victory, the party fielded its candidates in both the constituencies, which are the strongholds of YSR’s family, as a policy to oppose the YSRC’s corruption. The party lost the two seats by huge margins. Its candidate was pushed to the third place in Pulivendula.The outcome of the two by-elections made the main opposition party despondent and introspect on its strengths and weaknesses. Said a party leader: “We do not know whether to contest by-elections or not. It will be a tricky situation either if we enter or keep off a by-poll battle.”Some senior leaders are, however, of the view that YS Jagan was thoroughly exposed by the CBI probe and his public image got a beating. “If voters are guided by local issues like caste, candidate’s profile and corruption, the TDP will be in an advantage,” said a leader from Telangana.“In a triangular contest, the Congress’ votes will be divided between Congress and YSRC. The division of Congress votes will be an advantage to TDP. There is no Jagan or YSR wave in Andhra now,” claimed K Sivaprasada Rao.But, Telangana continues to be a lump in TDP’s throat. It is in such a helpless situation that it is still struggling to find potential candidates to contest elections. “We have no candidates for Mahaboobnagar, Kollapur and Nagarkurnool seats,” admitted an MLA from the region.
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