In a setback to the TRS in the MLC elections, three candidates backed by the ruling party lost in the elections to the Warangal-Khammam-Nalgonda Teachers’ constituency and the Karimnagar-Nizamabad-Adilabad Teachers’ and Graduates’ constituencies.
Polling for these seats were held on March 22 and the results declared late on Tuesday. In fact, in two of the three seats, the TRS-backed candidates were relegated to third place.
The pink party has been winning all elections since the formation of the state and coming to power in 2014. Since then, many elections were fought by TRS, including the Medak Lok Sabha and assembly bypolls, MLC elections, Rajya Sabha elections and recently-held gram panchayat elections, the results of all of which went in favour of TRS.
Though MLC elections were held on non-party basis, all the major parties such as TRS, Congress, BJP and CPM have fielded their supporters as candidates in the elections.
The parties have made it a prestige issue and even deputed their MLAs and ministers for campaigning.
In the Warangal-Khammam-Nalgonda Teachers’ constituency, Pula Ravinder, sitting MLC and Progressive Recognized Teachers’ Union (PRTU) candidate who was backed by TRS lost to CPM supported candidate and United Teachers’ Front (UTF) candidate Alugubelli Narsi Reddy. Of the 18,885 votes polled, Narsi Reddy secured 8,975 votes, while Pula Ravinder got 6,218 votes.
In the Medak-Nizamabad-Adilabad-Karimnagar Graduates’ constituency, Congress candidate and ex-MLA T Jeevan Reddy won by 39,000 votes , while BJP backed candidate Sugunakar Rao came second. TRS-backed candidate M Chandrasekhar Goud was pushed to the third spot.