Congress Lackluster Campaign in Kadapa Bypolls

In spite of a dozen ministers camping over there, the Congress party's bypoll campaign in Kadapa lacks luster. Congress is not even able to project anyone from the party as an acceptable leader to the Kadapa electorate nor it is in a position to criticize former CM YS Rajasekhar Reddy. The 12 congress ministers stay put in the district headquarters confined themselves to just press meets and door to door campaigning. They are avoiding holding of public meetings and roadshows for the fear that they may not yield the expected results.

What the 12 camping ministers in Kadapa doing is nothing more than holding press conferences and party cadre meetings only to criticize Jagan Mohan Reddy. Though poll posters carry the photograph of chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy along with YSR, hardly any leader speaks about the "good governance" and "able leadership" of Kiran Kumar Reddy. The people find the Congress unattractive was evident on the day its candidates DL Ravindra Reddy and YS Vivekananda Reddy filed their nominations. The crowd was hardly 500-strong while the people thronged by the thousands on the day Jagan filed his nomination papers two days ago. The observers feel that owing to cool response from the public, the candidates have so far avoided any public meeting or roadshows and confined themselves to door to door campaign.
In contrast to the Congress campaign, Jagan has chosen a novel method. He is covering 6 to 10 villages a day. He has got supporters in every village. They go round the village doing door to door campaign a day before Jagan arrives in the village. The next day, Jagan addresses the people in a roadshow. "This type of campaign appears to be effective and missing on the part of the ruling party," say the observers.