Munugode by-poll | Politics heat up further as Election Commission announces by-election schedule

Nomination process from October 7, polling on November 3, counting on November 6

The political heat in Munugode Assembly Constituency is set to go up further with the Election Commission announcing the schedule for the by-election caused by the resignation of sitting Congress MLA Komatireddy Rajgopal Reddy, who since joined Bharatiya Janata Party and contesting the election now.

As per the schedule issued, notification would be issued on October 7, last date for filing nomination papers will be October 14, scrutiny of nominations will be held on October 15 and last date for withdrawal of candidates will be October 17. Polling for the by-election will be held on November 3 and counting of votes will be taken up on November 6.

Along with BJP, the Congress party too has announced its candidate early by picking up Palvai Sravanthi. However, the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) is yet to name its candidate, although all the three parties have been engaged in a break-neck political activity by encouraging defections of village and mandal level leaders of the other parties.

The two left parties—CPI and CPI (M)—which have good mass base in the constituency have already decided to stay away from the by-election and announced support to TRS with a view to stop BJP making further inroads into Telangana with its “divisive agenda”. Besides, Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) led by former senior IPS officer R.S. Praveen Kumar and YSR Telangana Party led by Y.S. Sharmila and others have also made up their mind to test the waters before the next Assembly elections.

With all the three major political parties in the fray—Congress, BJP and TRS luring the village and mandal level leaders of other parties into their fold the politics at ground zero has become very clumsy. TRS has been pulling leaders from Congress and BJP, Congress has been poaching TRS and BJP cadres and the BJP has been attracting TRS and Congress leaders.

The TRS has been organising ‘vana bhojanams’ to lure leaders and cadre of BJP and Congress although the programme taken up by Minister G. Jagadish Reddy did not go well with a few leaders within the party, who alleged that they were not invited for such party programmes. Party president and Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao is already understood to have talked to a few front-runner aspirants including the candidate who contested last time K. Prabhakar Reddy already.

The TRS and BJP have already organised public meetings and the three parties have been holding mandal level meets frequently over the last one month. The constituency has over 2.7 lakh electorate with 70% of it comprised by backward classes. The Congress leadership is said to be planning to make positive use of the passage of Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Padayatra from Telangana during the by-election campaign period.