RS polls: Leaders from Telangana, Andhra Pradesh likely to be elected unopposed

With the deadline to file nominations for the Rajya Sabha polls having passed, all the candidates fielded by the parties in both Andhra Pradesh and Telangana are expected to be elected unopposed without any last-minute drama.

The Congress in Telangana and TDP in Andhra Pradesh had stayed away from contesting for the additional seat due to a lack of numbers.

For the first time, TDP will not have any representation in the upper House: unless the 'yellow party' improves its numbers in the Assembly in the upcoming polls, it may not enter the Rajya Sabha in future as and when vacancies come up. Meanwhile, YSRCP has all 11 Rajya Sabha seats from Andhra Pradesh.

Of the total three seats that had fallen vacant, with current numbers in Telangana assembly, the ruling Congress could have bagged two and the opposition BRS could have bagged one unanimously. However, if the Congress had fielded a third candidate or if the BRS had fielded more than one candidate, it would have required voting.

That being said, both the parties refrained from fielding additional candidates, thereby avoiding any acts of poaching. While the Congress picked former Union minister Renuka Chowdhary and young leader Anil Kumar Yadav for the two seats, the BRS re-nominated Vaddiraaju Ravichandra. All the three filed their nominations on Thursday.

If voting was necessitated in Telangana under the proportional representation method, a party would need around 31 first preference votes to elect one Rajya Sabha member. The Congress and its ally CPI have 65 MLAs and BRS has 39 MLAs in the Assembly. Hence, to bag the third seat, Congress would have needed at least 28 more first preference votes which means it would need the support of 28 MLAs. For BRS to win an additional seat, it would need the support of 23 more MLAs.

In Andhra Pradesh, voting would have been necessitated if the TDP had fielded a candidate—as it stands, the YSRCP can comfortably win all three seats.

The YSRCP had already faced the cross-voting menace in the MLC polls that was held in March last year. At least four YSRCP rebel MLAs had cross voted for a TDP candidate in those polls.

With many MLAs being denied tickets by Andhra Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy during the recent rejig, it would have been interesting to see the repercussions if the TDP had fielded a candidate that necessitated voting. However, the TDP decided not to.

“Since the general elections are not too far away, it's better we do not lose focus on them by fielding a candidate in Rajya Sabha polls. Better we stay away,” TDP supremo N Chandrababu Naidu is learnt to have said to senior colleagues in his party .

As per the size of the Andhra Pradesh Assembly, parties need at least 44 first-preference votes to bag each Rajya Sabha seat. TDP would have needed the support of at least 25 YSRCP MLAs to win a seat if the party had fielded a candidate.

Jagan picked his uncle, Y V Subba Reddy, MLA, Golla Babu Rao and a contractor from Annamayay district, Meda Raghunath Reddy.