Jagan's tally of around 6.92 lakh votes crushed D.L. Ravindra Reddy of the Congress by a margin of over 5.5 lakh votes.
Kadapa is where the problems for the Congress in Andhra Pradesh begin. Hyderabad and New Delhi are where they could reach fairly soon. Jaganmohan Reddy's sensational win in the by-election from the Kadapa parliamentary constituency, beating his nearest Congress rival by well over half a million votes, places the State party leadership in a bind and Kiran Reddy's future as Chief Minister in jeopardy. Adding to Jagan's victory is that of his mother Vijayamma from the Pulivendula Assembly segment of the same constituency.
Jagan's tally of around 6.92 lakh votes crushed D.L. Ravindra Reddy of the Congress by a margin of over 5.5 lakh votes. In this by-election, Kadapa's people mostly saw themselves as voting for the memory of Jagan's father Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, who was the Congress Chief Minister of the State when he died in 2009. Meanwhile, ‘YSR's' widow Vijayamma demolished Vivekananda Reddy, former Agriculture Minister in the Kiran Reddy Cabinet and YSR's brother, with a margin of around 86,000 votes. Jagan led massively in every single segment of the parliamentary seat. In the Pulivendula segment alone, his lead over D.L. Ravindra Reddy exceeded one lakh votes. In the end, the scale of his triumph lent credence to the popular joke that Ravindra's initials stood for “Deposit Loss.” As a matter of fact, barring Jagan and Vijayamma, every single candidate in both Kadapa and Pulivendula lost his or her deposit. That's over 60 persons, including all major party candidates like those of the Congress and the TDP. Chiranjeevi failed to deliver to the Congress even the meagre 63,000 votes that his Praja Rajyam Party candidate got in 2009. This despite the film star campaigning in Kadapa big time.
Kiran Reddy could soon discover what Chief Ministers like Anjaiah, Vijaya Bhaskara Reddy and Marri Chenna Reddy learned before him. That Andhra Congress dissidents have a particular genius for making the lives of their leaders miserable. It shouldn't take much time before Ministers start disobeying his orders, before MLAs start rebelling and troubling him. It could get worse than that, though. Already a strong section of Congress MLAs (including some of the Ministers who supposedly campaigned against him) really owe allegiance to Jagan. A second section of MLAs sits on the fence. A third will simply blackmail their leadership for better positions and portfolios. That's why the size of the winner's margin was always going to be the most important thing in this election. That Jagan would win was known. Also known was that his winning by a gigantic margin could start the unravelling of the Congress in the State. Hence the massive effort by the Congress to keep his margin down.
If the Congress is unable to contain this, there could be defections to Jagan's YSR Congress party. Or some MLAs could stage a drama of simultaneous resignations to force by-elections in several constituencies. The idea being to push Andhra Pradesh towards mid-term elections. If that comes off, the Congress would face a very rough time in all regions. In Telangana, the TRS would likely gain. In coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema, Jagan might prove a nightmare. Worse, the Congress has 33 MPs from Andhra Pradesh, more than from any other State. If a number of these declare their allegiance to Jagan, the UPA government at the Centre will find itself between a rock and a hard place.
The TDP, too, has been shown as being in big trouble. Its candidate, Mysoora Reddy, was certainly the best it could put up in Kadapa and he came third. Had he nosed ahead of the Congress candidate, the party could have drawn some comfort. Finishing third despite hard campaigning by Chandrababu Naidu is a blow. With his party tormented and divided by the Telangana issue, this setback raises questions of how effective Mr. Naidu's leadership now is.
But it is the Congress for which the testing times will likely come first. As many political veterans point out, it had the option of not contesting against Jagan and Vijayamma on grounds of respect to its departed leader YSR. Anti-Jagan Congress followers could then have voted for the TDP candidate. Instead the party made it such a high-profile battle that the scale of defeat is humiliating. Particularly for Chief Minister Kiran Reddy, whose time starts ticking now.
Keywords: Kadapa Lok Sabha by-poll, Jaganmohan Reddy
YSR the legend ..we will support his son YS Jagan.
excellent article by shri p.sainath regarding margin moves the centre. His views were most appropiate,..
Have we ever seen big leaders losing in Indian politics, even when their party status is shattered in the entire state. I strongly beleive that, for this election there was enormous psuedo hype, which was earlier initiated by the media and later supported by Congress-TDP duo and in the end well consolidated by CM Kiran Kumar reddy. Foremost thing that needs mention is that, this election should make every indian proud as he is living in a luxurious country where one individuals decision and immature desire to become the chief minister can bring elections in the country making use of tax payers money. Future soon follows, so not to talk much about it, but in the recent past which is not an assumption, we have not seen YS Jagan as a person with leadership qualities or a politician of vision. Least to mention about his speeches where the content is over loaded to get sympathy from his father's death or making some irrelevant statements. If i were to be a voter, i would not have voted in this election which were totally biased by money and emotional black mail. But the huge majority really speaks for the direction where my country is heading. It may be cricket,or politics or job or any thing else we are ruled by silly emotions rather than focussing on the right thing. This was a great opportunity for the voters to convey that they really do not want such mid term polls which were simply meant to show one person/groups muscle power. But for one more we succeded in wasting it. We donot need anti corruption movements or fasting un to death or some stupid welfare programs to trap the poor to cast their votes. We donot need Gandhis or Hazares to change the country. It is our minds and our attitudes that need to impart more civic sense and social responsibility in our individual living and thinking. Let us consider ourselves as developing nation only when, atleast one person of such kind, who brings up elections at improper time and for selfish reasons was awarded his due treament based on social and ethical sense rather than by emotional issues.
The beginning of the end for the rotten Congress.The time for telling lies to the people is over and they will have to sit in the opposition for ever.The kind of mis-governance they demonstrated clearly showed that they were digging their own graves. With TDP a spent force due to it's one wheel bicycle, the YSR Congress is the new Party to reckon with. If Rahul gandhi can claim to be the next PM why could Jagan not be made the next CM after YSR.You can not have one set of rules at the Centre and another in the States. Congressmen WAKE UP.
YS Jaganmohan reddy, should plan for making it as a National party soon. It is not known about his plans. If he plans well and become the Prime Minister, the whole country is going to be benefited and for funds he need not depend on some body who is running the politics in a cheapest mannaer. YSJM Reddy should start moral politics in the whole country. Moral politics will become the basis for corruptionless society. When morals are vanished in the Indian National Congress itself, where from the morals can be expected. It is sure YSJM Reddy is capable of building moral politics. For establishing a Government of the people, by the people and for the people, today only YSJMReddy is capable.Though Dr Manmohan singh is pure with regard to corruption, he is poor in internal politics.
Please Email the Editor