Hyderabad: Soon after the bypolls to seven Assembly segments scheduled for this month, ruling Congress in Andhra Pradesh faces an uphill task with another round of by-elections necessitated in 17 other constituencies.
The present round of bypolls to the seven Assembly seats, slated for March 18, is an acid test for the party as six of them are in the volatile Telangana region.
The Congress is accused of betraying the Telangana people by not accepting the separate statehood demand despite allegedly making a promise.
The bypolls in five of the six seats in Telangana are necessitated as the incumbent MLAs quit in support of the separate statehood cause. The sitting MLA in another seat died which caused the by-election.
Riding on the strong statehood sentiment, those who resigned are expected to win in their re-election bid.
The bye-election in the lone constituency in non-Telangana region is necessitated as the sitting TDP MLA had quit in support of Kadapa MP YS Jagan Mohan Reddy.
Soon after the March 18 bypolls, the Congress would face the first electoral face-off with Jagan, who quit the party in late 2010 following differences with Congress high command, in the form of by-elections to another 17 seats.
The bypolls in 16 of them are caused as the sitting Congress MLAs were disqualified last week by Assembly Speaker for violating party whip by voting against the government during a TDP-sponsored no-confidence motion in December last.
While disqualifying the 16 MLAs, the Speaker had accepted the resignation of one MLA of erstwhile Praja Rajyam who shifted loyalty to Jagan.
The second round of by-elections for 17 Assembly seats, likely to be held in June, would be a tough electoral battle for the Congress beset with problems of internal dissidence, uncertainty over Telangana issue and the formidable threat
from Jagan and main opposition TDP.
Jagan would leave no stone unturned to win the 17 seats as they were hitherto held by his loyalists. Moreover, it will be a do or die situation for him to win them for emerging as a force to reckon with in the 2014 Assembly polls.
A good show at the hustings would be sine qua non for the Telugu Desam, which lost power in 2004, to emerge victorious in the 2014 polls.
The Jagan-led YSR Congress had alleged that the Congress got the Speaker to delay disqualification of the MLAs as it did not want to face all the bypolls at one go.
In addition to the bypolls, Congress also faces biennial Rajya Sabha elections, scheduled to be held on March 30, in which it can win four seats.
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