Congress suffered a major reverse when it lost the by-election to the 27th division of the Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation (GVMC) to the Telugu Desam and was forced to share the second place with the Praja Rajyam.
Counting of votes of the by-election held on Wednesday took place at the Swarna Bharati Indoor Stadium on Saturday. TDP’s Vanapalli Ravikumar polled 4,126 votes to emerge winner with a margin of 2,619 votes while Bandikana Srinivasa Rao of the PRP and Pottangi Sai Lakshmi of the Congress, a two-time corporator in the past, secured 2,007 votes each. A total of 8,859 votes (67.26 per cent) were polled and were counted in three rounds.
Sympathy factor
The Congress had not only lost the seat vacated by Tynala Vijayakumar after he was elected as MLA of Visakhapatnam North in the Assembly elections a few months ago, but also had the mortification of its candidate trailing the PRP candidate in the last two rounds even as Mr. Ravikumar led by nearly 1,300 votes over her in the first round itself. Sympathy due to death of former Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy was also not felt here. R. Vijayakumar won from this division in the February 2007 elections as a Congress rebel, defeating Mr. Ravikumar, who contested as another Congress rebel, by a margin of about 400 votes. He stayed with the Congress in the crucial time when the party needed his support and another nine independents to claim the Mayorship and was rewarded with the city Congress president’s post and later the party ticket in the Assembly elections.
Congress deployed its district Minister, MPs, MLAs and all its corporators for the 27th division by-election but came a cropper.
Observers felt that the party fielded a weak candidate, did not take into consideration the caste configuration in the division and thus suffered a big loss.
Mr. Ravikumar said people of the division presented a Dasara gift to TDP president N. Chandrababu Naidu by electing him with a huge margin. “This is people’s victory and they showed their wisdom by rejecting the Congress.” He was with the people all the time since February 2007 and his hard work paid off, and thus sympathy factor did not count here, he said. Winning a by-election in a division which was held by the Congress for the last 20 years was not an easy task but he could succeed with the support of people and party leaders, Mr. Ravikumar added. With the win, TDP took its strength in the GVMC to 33. Congress’ now has 36 corporators (including nine independents) and ex-officio members in the form of MLAs and MPs and enjoys a comfortable majority in spite of the losing the division.
Results: Vanapalli Ravikumar (TDP) 4,626; Bandikana Srinivasa Rao (Praja Rajyam) 2,007; Pottangi Sai Lakshmi (Congress) 2,007; M. Srinivasa Rao (Lok Satta) 130, L. Venkata Rao (BJP) 89. Total and valid votes: 8,859.
