Hyderabad: Chief Election Commissioner Om Prakash Rawat on Saturday ruled out holding byelections for the five Lok Sabha seats vacated by the YSRC and an Assembly constituency in Andhra Pradesh. Speaking to the media on Saturday at Delhi while announcing the election schedule for five states, Mr Rawat said there would be no byelections for AP.
He said the resignations of the five YSRC Lok Sabha members were accepted on June 4, and the term of the Lok Sabha would end on June 3, 2019. As the term of these Lok Sabha constituencies would be less than a year, byelections would not be held, he said. Mr Rawat also said that there would be no byelection to the Araku Assembly constituency from where a legislator was killed by Maoists.
YSRC MPs Mekapati Rajamohan Reddy, Y.V. Subba Reddy, P.V. Mithun Reddy, V. Varaprasada Rao and Y.S. Avinash Reddy had resigned in protest against the BJP-led NDA government at Centre for not granting Special Category Status to AP. Both the TD and the YSRC had thrown challenges and counter challenges over winning in these Lok Sabha constituencies in the byelections. The Araku Assembly seat fell vacant recently after TD MLA Kidari Sarweswara Rao was killed by Maoists. As the remaining Assembly term is less than a year, no bypoll will be held there too.
