As expected, the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) candidate V. Yadav Reddy has won the MLC election from the Local Area Constituency (LAC) in Medak. Out of the total 1,018 votes polled, Dr. Yadav Reddy got 762 votes against Congress candidate T. Nirmala Jayaparakash Reddy who secured 238 votes. Independent candidate Malla Reddy got six votes and 12 votes were invalid. With this Mr. Yadav Reddy declared elected with 524 votes majority.

By roping in District Congress Committee (DCC) president, and his wife, Nirmala Jayaprakash Reddy as party candidate in the MLC elections, Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) working president T. Jayaprakash Reddy made the election prestigious for the ruling party and all the way he tried to irritate the TRS.

With Congress being in the race and his efforts to lure some voters from the ruling party, the TRS was forced to organise camps and send its voters to various places with all sort of facilities to prevent any poaching. At one point of time, the TRS even lodged a complaint with the State Election Commission (SEC) that Mr. Jayaprakash Reddy has been trying to lure its voters and he even contacted some of them over phone, though they were in a camp.

Mr. Jayaprakash Reddy claimed that the party has 230 voters in the LAC and he would resign for his party post even if a single vote was crossed to the ruling party. The party got 238 votes against its strength. Who voted for the Congress candidate is a big question. It could be that some independents or the BJP members or it may have been some disgruntled TRS elements.

The TRS has claimed that it has a strength of 777 votes in the LAC. However, it was able to get only 762 votes and that means the party has failed to get the votes of all its members. It was stated that two or three voters could not participate in the voting.

“Our actual strength in LAC is only 754. All of them won on the B Form issued by the party in various elections. In addition to that, we got another eight votes taking the total votes polled to our candidate to 762, though we had claimed our strength as 777 during the campaign. The actual strength of Congress was 274 but it got polled only 238 votes. There are about 30 votes for BJP and independents and some of those votes were shared by both of us,” explained a TRS leader, on condition of anonymity.