It is brothers' fight at Nandigama

• Devineni Uma fights with TDP flag
• Devineni Nehru on Congress

Nandigama (Krishna): The September 13 by-election here is seen as a fight between the two siblings– former minister Devineni Rajasekhar Nehru of the Congress and Minister for Irrigation Devineni Umamaheswara Rao of the Telugu Desam. Though the two parties have the candidates testing their time in the by-election, the real fighters are these two brothers.

Former minister Rajasekhar Nehru has been camping in the constituency from the day one along with several Congress leaders each one holding in charge of one village. He is in regular contact with the voters knocking at every door. His presence had made several other Congress leaders to take part in the hectic electioneering, an attempt to revive the Congress.

Though the Congress leaders admit their defeat in the by-election, they justify their contest. "We have taken this election for two reasons. The first is to expose the Telugu Desam which had promised total loan waiver to the farmers and women and had failed to do it till date. The farmers and women are in trouble now. We are exposing the dubious role of Chandrababu Naidu," the former minister said.

On the other side, Minister for Irrigation Umamaheswara Rao is in constant touch with his party workers. He had made his party leaders to move to the villages and ensure that the party's vote bank is not disturbed by the presence of the Congress. While most of the TD leaders are confident that their party candidate, Tangirala Sowmya, will win the election hands down, some are worried about the possible increase of vote bank for the Congress this time. In the 2009 elections, the Congress secured just 1988 votes out of the total 1,55,136 votes polled, which is just 1.28 per cent. This time the Congress is looking for a dominant share from the YSR Congress' vote bank, which secured 72,463 votes giving just 5,000 votes majority to the Telugu Desam.

While the Congress wants a considerable shift of votes from the YSR Congress this time, the TD is firm on checkmating the party. Minister for Irrigation Umamaheswara Rao had already instructed his party men to ensure that the YSR Congress voters remained neutral.

Meanwhile, YSR Congress leader Dr M Jaganmohana Rao who lost the 2014 elections, held a meeting with his party leaders at Nandigama on Monday and had asked them to be neutral in the election. He said that the party high command had decided not to participate in the by-election and wanted the leaders to keep off from both the campaign and voting.

MRPS to back TDP
Madiga Reservation Porata Samiti (MRPS) leader Manda Krishna said here on Monday that the organisation would support the Telugu Desam Party in the Nandigama Assembly by-election, as it had cooperated twice in SC categorisation backing the Madiga community.

Manda Krishna appealed to voters to support TDP candidate Sowmya in the by-polls. He said a vote for the Congress party would not help the Madiga community. The MRPS leader urged the independent candidates to back Sowmya.

He called upon Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu to stand by his word of repaying in gratitude to Madigas for their support to the party.