Shankar Rao blames CM, Botsa for defeat in by-polls

Former minister Dr P Shankar Rao on Saturday blamed the leadership of Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy and PCC president Botsa Satyanarayana for the party's failure to win the by-elections.

Talking to reporters outside the Congress Legislature Party Office, Dr Shankar Rao claimed that the Congress party has lost a major chunk of its voters to YSR Congress party. While the Congress party won the same 18 assembly seats in 2009 elections with a majority of 178,208 votes in 2009 elections, YSRCP won those seats with a whopping majority of 4,23,274 votes.  Similarly, the YSRCP polled a total of 12,37,612 votes in the by-elections followed by 635,302 votes by the TDP and the Congress party stood third with 595,341 votes. He said both the TDP and Congress together got 6,969 less votes than the YSRCP.

The Congress candidates lost their deposits in seven assembly segments and stood second in five segments. The TDP candidates stood second in 10 constituencies and lost deposits in five seats. Similarly, in Nellore Lok Sabha seats, Mekapati Rajamohan Reddy won by-elections with an additional majority of 54,993 votes compared to 2009 elections.

Dr Shankar Rao said that the statistics clearly prove that people have been losing faith on the Congress party due to the inefficient leadership of Kiran Kumar Reddy and Botsa Satyanarayana. He said it was because of their selfish attitude that the Congress was relegated to the third position.

Further, Dr Shankar Rao said that Kadapa MP Jaganmohan Reddy's arrest during campaigning went against the Congress party. Just a day before the polling, Jagan was brought in a regular van to the court and he was treated as a convict although he was just an accused in the case. The frequent checking of luggage of Vijayamma and Sharmila too backfired against the Congress party.

The former minister also hailed the candidature of Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee for the President's Post. He thanked Sonia Gandhi for nominating Pranab as UPA's candidate for Presidential elections.