HYDERABAD: After the hectic long electioneering for the Lok Sabha elections, the Congress has shifted its focus to the byelection to the Legislative Council seat from the Warangal-Khammam-Nalgonda graduates' constituency, which is scheduled for May 27. Party leaders will step up their campaign from Wednesday to reach out to 4.6 lakh graduate voters in the three districts. All 34 Assembly segments in these three districts are represented by Congress MLAs.
Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy reviewed poll preparedness with senior leaders of three districts on Tuesday. He directed party MLAs to take the responsibility to ensure victory for Congress candidate Chinthapandu ‘Teenmar Mallanna’ Naveen’s victory by explaining to every voter how the Congress government had filled 30,000 posts within 100 days and how it planned to fill 2 lakh vacancies by December this year.
The seat fell vacant after BRS MLC Palla Rajeshwar Reddy was elected as Jangaon MLA in November. The BRS has fielded Anugula Rakesh Reddy, a former BJP spokesperson, and the BJP has nominated Gujjala Premender Reddy
The Congress is banking on Revanth Reddy's popularity among students, youth and graduates and his commitment to fill two lakh vacancies in government departments by December this year as promised during Assembly polls.
Apart from distributing appointment letters to nearly 30,000 newly-recruited staff at public meetings soon after coming to power in December — the recruitments were blocked during the previous BRS regime due to legal issues — after clearing the hurdles in the High Court. He also released the TSPSC Group-1 notification to fill 563 posts and the Mega DSC notification for 11,000 teacher posts in government schools. The Congress hopes to gain the support of unemployed graduates, students and youth in MLC bypoll due to the initiative taken by the Chief Minister within 100 days of coming to power.
