The upcoming bypolls for 18 assembly seats in AP are going to be more crucial for Telugu Desam party than the Congress and Jagan Mohan Reddy's YSRCP. These byelections are not only going to decide the fate of YSRCP and Kiran Kumar's chief ministership, but also are a precursor for TDP's prospects in 2014 general elections.

It is to be recalled that, among the recent bypolls held in 7 constituencies, only 1 seat was in seemandhra region and other six were in Telangana. While Telangana sentiment ruled the rooste in six constituencies, the lone Kovur seat was won by YSRCP. Now the situation is totally opposite, there are 17 seats in seemandhra region and only one in Telangana (Parakala, Warangal district). Moreover, all the 17 seats (Except Chiranjeevi's Tirupathi) belonged to Congress previously and were vacated for siding with Jagan Mohan Reddy's YSRCP. The interesting part of these bypolls is, previously the electorate was split into Congress, TDP and PRP parties in these constituencies. Now it will be split into Congress, TDP and YSRCP. That is to say, Jagan will invariably eat into Congress and PRP combine vote bank.

Now it is for the TDP to cope up with the situation. Firstly, it has to keep its vote bank intact and see that Jagan won't make his way into it. Secondly, it should be able split the Congress-PRP votes in its favour. Going by present situation, it seems very difficult for TDP to stop Jagan from making a dent in its vote-bank, particularly because of the SCs' sway towards YSRCP in north coastal districts. Any decrease in TDP vote-base now, will certainly hamper its prospects in 2014.