High voter turnout always indicates a clear mandate  

••TDP pins hope on massive victory

••CM Jagan’s statement creates confusion

•Anxious moments in political circles

Patibandla Srinivas

(pnsjournalist@gmail.com)

Amaravati: The high voter turnout in the election history of Andhra Pradesh has always revealed a one-sided victory. There has been no place for tough competition or narrow victory for any political party in the high voter turnout election in the past, as per the election records.

According to records, it was favourable to the Opposition parties most of the time. As per the polling trend, the Opposition TDP pinned hopes on winning chances.  

Read this article also:

A story on second time retaining power in Telugu States

Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy’s statement and high voter turnout confused the public and political circles including TDP on their result-oriented expectations. The long queues in polling booths in the present election remind the previous 2019 elections when the voter turnout was registered at almost 80 per cent.  

Then especially the women voters’ high turnout in queue lines created confidence in the TDP in that particular election due to the government led by Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu deposited cash into their accounts just election before in the name of Pasupu Kumkuma.

However, the results shocked the then-ruling TDP after the Opposition YSR Congress registered a landslide victory with 151 Assembly and 22 Lok Sabha seats.

Now the TDP is confident based on the information at the grassroots level. Political pundits, experts, and survey organisations opined that the anti-incumbency factor would dominate the welfare schemes of the YSR Congress government. The majority of poll studies expressed their view that the TDP would win the highest number of seats in the present election.

Several organisations conducted area-wise studies before the polling. As per the studies the YSR Congress is in an advantageous position only in Kurnool, Kadapa and Chittoor districts. The TDP improved the prospects in Chittoor and Kurnool in the last hour.  

In this backdrop, high voter turnout especially the queue lines from morning hours in the entire state of Andhra Pradesh raised special debate among the public. YS Jagan Mohan Reddy’s statement and previous election experience have raised new speculations.

As per the election history of Andhra Pradesh, the high voter turnout registered in 1989, 1994, 2004, 2009, 2014, and 2019 elections. The people gave their mandate in favour of Opposition parties in the elections. All the Opposition parties won with a sufficient number of seats to run the government. But only in the 2009 elections, the ruling Congress party won the election but it had dropped almost 4 plus vote percentage from 42 to 36 percent. But the triangle fight with the erstwhile PRP led by actor Chiranjeevi helped the ruling party’s victory. Otherwise, then the Opposition party would have won the election, as per the records. The records say that the election would also be a one-sided victory.