Bypolls prospect scares Congress, TDP

Hyderabad, March 18: Though both the Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy and the PCC Chief Botsa Satyanarayana asserted that the Congress leadership was not afraid of by-elections to be caused by the disqualification of MLAs who defied the whip and voted for the no-confidence motion, it is learnt that the ruling party would delay the disqualification to avoid by-elections. Likewise, the TDP is also in no mood to get its own members disqualified and face by-elections.

Nine members of the Congress and six members of the TDP defied their party whips during the voting on the no-confidence motion of the TRS and YSRCP.

According to section 151(A) of the Representation of People's act, by-elections need not be held if they were to be held with less than one year before the general elections. Now there is a 14 month time before general elections are to be held. If the government delays the disqualification for another two months, it could disqualify the defiant MLAs and yet need not face the by-elections.

Congress MLAs Ranga Rao (Bobbili), Dwarampudi Chandrasekhar Reddy (Kakinada) Alla Nani (Eluru) Rajesh (CHintalapudi), Perni Nani (Machilipatnam), Gottipati Ravi Kumar (Addanki), Siva Prasad Reddy (Darsi), Peddireddy Ramachandra Reddy (Punganuru) and Jogi Ramesh (Pedana) had violated the party whip and supported the no-confidence motion moved by the TRS.

Likewise, TDP MLAs Vanita, Bala Nagi Reddy, Sai Raju, Kodali Nani, Amaranath Reddy and Praveen Kumar Reddy also violated their party whips and voted against the government, following the stand taken by the YSR Congress.

Now if these MLAs are disqualified immediately, the Election Commission would have to hold by-elections to all the 15 seats as there is more than one year time before the general elections.

Congress is scared of holding the by-elections. If it gets defeated in these by-polls, it would have serious effect on the general election results. If most of the seats are won by the YSR Congress, then there would be an overwhelming feeling both in the political circles as well as people that Congress had reached the end of its road.

Considering all these aspects, Congress is said to be planning to delay the disqualification till June, to avoid the by-elections. This would also throw the defiant MLAs unemployed. They would have to spend a year as former MLAs.

As the Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi said PCCs should resolve their problems without approaching the high command, the Chief Minister and the PCC Chief are trying to solve this problem themselves. They met at the Chief Minister's office in the Council on Saturday and discussed the issue.

They have decided to discuss the issue at the Congress Legislature Party's meeting on March 20 and take a decision. A decision on the disqualification of the 9 MLAs of the party would be taken in that meeting. The CLP would then request the Speaker accordingly.

Likewise the TDP also would have to take a decision on its MLAs. If that party also fears by-elections, it may also delay recommending the disqualification till June and then mount pressure on the Speaker, to make its MLAs sit idle as former MLAs for an year.

When the Congress and TDP petition to the Speaker to disqualify their members, he would not immediately take decision. He would call the members and hear their explanations. Then he would call the leaders of the parties and discuss about the explanations offered by the defiant members.

It is after this, that the Speaker would take a decision on disqualification. Congress is taking care that all this process would take as long as possible and the disqualifications would occur only after June.