Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy and PCC president Botsa Satyanarayana have accepted responsibility for the defeat of the Congress in the bypolls. The Chief Minister and the PCC chief drew heavy flak from senior Congress leaders who blamed the debacle on their incompetence, but they stopped short of demanding their resignations.
Mr Nagam Janardhan Reddy, who had resigned from the Telugu Desam and had sought re-election as an Independent under the banner of the Telangana Nagara Samithi, won from Nagarkurnool. For Jagan the victory in Kovur was extremely important as the party could prove its strength outside Kadapa, the home turf of the YSR family. Party leaders exuded confidence that the results would have a positive impact on the by-polls to the 17 Assembly segments where the MLAs had supported Jagan braving disqualification.
Wednesday’s results were worst for the Congress and the TD as both of them could not win even a single seat. To make matters worse, the TD lost deposits in Kamareddy while the Congress candidate barely escaped facing a similar fate in Station Ghanpur. Ironically, the TD, too, put up a brave front with N. Chandrababu Naidu stating that the party could now boldly campaign in the T-region. But, the reality was that the TD could secure second position only in Station Ghanpur where its nominee, Mr K. Srihari who is pro-Telangana, campaigned without a single photo of Mr Naidu.