)
The second phase polls in Andhra Pradesh for 25 Parliament and 175 Assembly constituencies spread across 13 districts of coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema region (Seemandhra) are being held on Wednesday.
About 333 candidates for Lok Sabha and 2,243 for the Assembly seats are in the fray. The YSR Congress Party, Telugu Desam Party (TDP)-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) combine and the Congress have fielded their candidates in all the constituencies.
The region has 36.56 million registered voters for whom the election authorities have set up over 40,000 poling stations. Around 122,000 policemen and para-military forces have been deployed in the poll-bound districts to ensure law and order, according to state Director General of Police (DGP) B Prasada Rao. The DGP said the deployment of force was considerably higher than what it was in the 2009 elections.
On the Tamil Nadu DGP's view that the bomb blast that occurred in the Bangalore-Guwahati Express at Chennai railway station recently was perhaps meant to target AP, Rao said it would be known only after they find exactly at what point the said bombs were planted in the train, whether at Bangalore station or at Chennai station.
Wednesday’s election will go down in the history of Seemandhra as the last general election being held in the undivided state of Andhra Pradesh. It is also perceived to be one of the expensive electoral battles ever fought in this region. A few rich businessmen and industrialists are contesting as first-time candidates in a handful of Lok Sabha and the Assembly constituencies in a sign of growing influence of money and business class over Seemandhra politics.
YSR Congress of YS Jagan Mohan Reddy and TDP led by N Chandrababu Naidu are locked in a fierce electoral battle in a bid to come to power in the residual Andhra Pradesh state that would come into existence on June 2. While Reddy is contesting from the Pulivendula Assembly constituency once held by his father and former chief minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy, Naidu is contesting from his sitting Kuppam Assembly seat in Chittoor district.
Former chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy, who quit the Congress party in protest against the state bifurcation and floated a separate party Jai Samaikhyandhra Party (JSP), has stayed away from contesting the election.
Though his party fielded candidates to a limited number of Assembly and Parliament constituencies, their presence is not being taken seriously by rivals. Some JSP candidates have even joined the TDP just when the election campaign ended on Monday. In a further embarrassment, the party’s Visakhapatnam Lok Sabha candidate Sabbam Hari on Tuesday announced he was withdrawing from the fray in favour of the BJP candidate.
