M A I N   N E W S

Post-win, Jagan dares Congress to snap poll
Suresh Dharur/TNS

Hyderabad, May 14
After the massive victory in the Lok Sabha byelection, YSR Congress president YS Jagan Mohan Reddy today challenged the ruling Congress to order snap polls to the Andhra Pradesh Assembly and claimed that his party would sweep the elections.

“Both the Congress and main Opposition the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) would lose their deposits if polls were held now as the people of the state were waiting to teach them a fitting lesson,” Jagan said, a day after pulling off a stunning victory in the byelection to Kadapa Lok Sabha constituency with a staggering 5.43 lakh majority.

“I am throwing a challenge at the Congress and the TDP. Let there be fresh elections and they will be defeated so badly that the history will remember it,” Jagan said. His mother YS Vijayamma also emerged victorious in Pulivendula with over 85,000 margin. The Congress and the TDP candidates lost their deposits in both places.

The 38-year-old industrialist-turned-politician taunted the Congress to go to people seeking votes in the name of Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi and said he would approach voters carrying the photograph of his father late YS Rajasekhar Reddy. “Let us see who will get public mandate,” he said.

During the bypoll campaign, Jagan had projected the contest as a fight between Sonia Gandhi and YSR. The bypoll outcome would mark the beginning of a change in the state, he asserted. Jagan’s remarks assume significance in the backdrop of reports that he might try to destabilise the Kiran Kumar Reddy government, which has a wafer-thin majority in the House.