Jagan rise worries rivals as Prasanna retains Kovur(timesofindia)

It is a clear message to the ruling Congress and main opposition Telugu Desam Party (TDP) that Jaganmohan Reddy is here to stay and could emerge as a key player in the 2014 general elections. Those who had dubbed his triumph in last year's Kadapa byelections as a sympathy vote for YSR family would now have to sit up and take notice of the Kovur verdict where his nominee Prasanna Kumar Reddy trounced high-profile TDP and Congress candidates.

Prasanna defeated his brother-in-law and TDP veteran Somireddi Chandramohan Reddy by a margin of 23,496 votes. Congress nominee Polamreddi Srinivasula Reddy was relegated to third spot. By snatching a seat from TDP and pushing Congress to third, Jagan has made his intentions clear vis-a-vis the 2014 general elections. But before that, Jagan has a big role to play in the bypolls necessitated by the resignation of 17 loyalists MLAs from the Assembly.

The Kovur byelection was the first electoral battle outside his Kadapa stronghold ever since Jagan parted ways with the Congress. The Congress and TDP both took the election as a matter of prestige with a single-point agenda of humiliating Jagan. Unlike Kadapa, Kovur cannot be said to be a Reddy stronghold which is why Jagan's political rivals have much to worry about.

"The Kovur win proves that Congress can ill afford to ignore Jagan," said a senior analyst. The seat was originally held by TDP's Prasanna, who quit the Assembly to join Jagan's party.

While Chandrababu Naidu vigorously toured the constituency, party bigwigs like Kiran Kumar Reddy, Botsa Satyanarayana, Chiranjeevi and V Hanumantha Rao campaigned for the Congress candidate.

Prasanna polled 73,876 votes and Chandramohan Reddy secured 50,380 votes leaving Srinivasula Reddy with 41,307 votes. Interestingly, TDP got 73,212 votes and Congress 65,768 votes in the last general elections. Prasanna had won that contest by a slim margin of 8,000 votes.

In what is a clear indication that Jagan's party split the vote and made gains off its rivals, TDP and Congress lost 23,000 and 15,000 votes, respectively, to YSR Congress. Also, Jagan's party carved out a new vote base of about 36,000 votes in Kovur. The YSR Congress secured nearly 42.06% of the total 1,75,603 votes polled. Chandrababu Naidu's party managed just about 28% of the votes while 23.48% ballots were cast in favour of Congress.