Parties save best strategies for tomorrow's Tirupati bypoll

Tirupati/ Amaravati: The microphones have fallen silent as the campaign for the Tirupati Lok Sabha by-elections has come to an end. Leaders of all major parties who were so far busy in roadshows and public meetings have now started focussing attention on poll management and analysing the vote share. The political parties are working out strategies to prevent cross-voting for the bypoll slated for Saturday.

Barring Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy all-important ministers, including Peddireddy Ramachandra Reddy, K Narayana Swamy, Anil Kumar Yadav, Mekapati Goutham Reddy, Perni Nani, and party leaders, including TTD chairperson YV Subba Reddy had campaigned for the party candidate Dr M Gurumoorthy. They had covered all the interior areas of the constituency.

The party leaders claim that they would win with a huge majority of three lakh votes. The ruling party feels that with all Opposition parties in the fray, the non-YSRCP votes would get split and YSRCP will win with a bigger majority than what it had got in the 2019 elections.

The main opposition party TDP, which feels it is a do-or-die situation, had also taken up an intensive campaign. It had announced the name of Panabaka Lakshmi ahead of all parties and kick-started the campaign for almost three months. TDP national president N Chandrababu Naidu took the responsibility of the campaign on his shoulders and covered all the seven assembly constituencies. Party general secretary Nara Lokesh has been camping in Tirupati. He attracted a large number of crowds during his roadshows and public meetings.

The TDP candidate focussed her campaign on the local issues. The state BJP, which took a long time to announce the name of retired IAS officer Ratna Prabha as its candidate, roped in many Central leaders, including Sunil Deodhar who has been camping in Tirupati and even national president J P Nadda and all its Rajya Sabha members participated in the campaign.