Hyderabad: Andhra Pradesh will witness a
series of elections in 2012 including by-polls for seven
Assembly seats that fell vacant in November last.
The seats fell vacant following the resignation of MLAs
on different issues. Of the total seven, six seats are in
Telangana region and the other in coastal Andhra.
However, by-elections will also become inevitable in 17
other seats -- one in Telangana and the rest in
Andhra-Rayalaseema regions -- if as many MLAs, belonging to
the ruling Congress and (one of) the erstwhile Praja Rajyam
Party (PRP), get disqualified for voting against the
government in the Assembly in December last.
The disqualification petitions are expected to be
disposed of in the next few days ahead of the ensuing budget
session of the Legislature.
Also, three Congress members of the Legislative Council
are facing disqualification for going against the party and
by-elections should be held for these seats as well, in the
event of their disqualification.
Soon after the by-elections, biennial elections to six
Rajya Sabha seats from the state are due in April.
The outcome of the by-elections to the Assembly seats
will determine whether or not the Congress government dares to
go for the long overdue elections to urban local bodies as
well as rural local bodies. But, the government will be left
with no option except to conduct the local bodies' elections
to avert any constitutional crisis.
Immediately thereafter, elections to co-operative
institutions, which are also overdue, need to be held.
But, all eyes are focused primarily on the
by-elections -- being dubbed as the 'mini general elections'
-- for the Assembly seats, as the stakes are very high for the
four main parties.
The fate of the Kiran Kumar Reddy government hinges on
the outcome of the by-polls as, on its own, it has now been
reduced to a minority in the 294-member House.
PTI
First Published: Wednesday, January 25, 2012, 15:12