Telangana Elections 2023: The curious case of Kodad and Huzurnagar constituencies

Once a stronghold of TDP in the erstwhile AP, Kodad constituency still has some presence of the TDP. in Huzurnagar meanwhile, the cadre of YSRCP are still active in Huzurnagar assembly constituency

Suryapet: The political equations in two constituencies in the erstwhile Nalgonda district, with both being geographically quite close to the neighbouring Andhra Pradesh, are likely to turn quite interesting as the Assembly election approaches.

Once a stronghold of the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) in the erstwhile AP, Kodad constituency still has some presence of the TDP. in Huzurnagar meanwhile, the cadre of the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) are still active in Huzurnagar assembly constituency. The political equations in these two adjacent constituencies are likely to see more fluctuations and undercurrents than in the other assembly constituencies in erstwhile Nalgonda district. Though Miryalaguda and Nagarjuna Sagar border these two constituencies, the political atmosphere is different there.

---

It is keeping in mind these peculiarities that the TDP has already announced Muthineni Saideshwar Rao as its candidate in Kodad. Saideshwar Rao, the founder of SV Educational institutions, is already campaigning. In the 2014 elections, the then TDP candidate Bollam Mallaiah Yadav had ended up second with 68,592 votes. TDP candidates had won in the elections in 1985, 1989 and 1994 as well. Mallaiah Yadav later joined the TRS (now BRS) and won in 2018 and is aiming at another win this time. Though the TDP did not field its candidate in 2018, this time, it is hoping to make some noise and at least cause a dent in the vote banks of other parties. The Congress has announced N Padmavathi Reddy as its candidate in Kodad. She had defeated Mallaiah Yadav (then with TDP) in 2014, but lost to him in 2018, when he was a BRS candidate.

In Huzurnagar, the YSRCP enjoys support from the people of a particular caste. In 2014 elections, YSRCP candidate Gattu Srikanth Reddy got 16.55 percent of votes (29,692). In the by-elections to the Huzurnagar assembly constituency in 2019, YSRCP members openly supported BRS candidate Sanampudi Saidi Reddy and attended the public meeting meetings of the BRS (then TRS) holding their party flags. Saidi Reddy won. This time, the Congress is fielding N Uttam Kumar Reddy, who won as MLA from Huzurnagar in 2009, 2014 and 2018 before resigning and heading to the Parliament. Interestingly, Saidi Reddy had lost to Uttam Kumar Reddy in 2018, but defeated the latter’s wife Padmavathi Reddy in the 2019 by-poll.