Azharuddin puts Congress in a bind over Jubilee Hills bypoll

Even as the Election Commission of India (ECI) is yet to formally notify byelection, former cricketer and Congress leader Md Azharuddin declared himself party candidate for the bypoll for the Jubilee Hills constituency. However, Telangana PCC chief Mahesh Kumar Goud made it clear that it was not yet certain since the party would go through the usual process before finalizing its candidate.

In the 2023 assembly elections, Azharuddin lost the election by 16,000 votes to BRS candidate M Gopinath, whose death this month necessitated the bypoll. It was then a quadrangular contest with the AIMIM and BJP, besides the BRS, being in the fray. But this time around, the Owaisi brothers are likely to support the Congress, making it a triangular contest.

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Jubilee Hills is a constituency of immense importance to the ruling Congress as it could not win a single seat from Hyderabad in the Assembly elections.

The bypoll in the constituency will give the grand old party an opportunity to wrest the seat from the KCR party. Currently, the Congress has a lone MLA, from the Secunderabad constituency, who won the seat in a bypoll. Moreover, Chief Minister Revanth Reddy’s Hyderabad residence coming under the Jubilee Hills constituency, it has become a prestige issue for the party to win the bypoll.

The upmarket locality has 33 per cent minority Muslim voters, which was why the party chose to field Azharuddin in 2023. However, the AIMIM thwarted the Congress bid by strategically pitting its own candidate against him. However, Azharuddin would still have fallen short of votes even if AIMIM candidate’s 8,000 votes had gone in his favour as Gopinath had won by about 16,000 votes.

This time around, with the BJP deciding to contest the by-election it is going to be a triangular contest.

Of late, there has been speculation that Md Azharuddin, after losing Jubilee Hills constituency last time, will not get a ticket from the Congress this time. Instead, the ticket might go to someone from the majority community. This has prompted the former cricketer to declare that he was going to be the candidate for Jubilee Hills again with the blessings of the Gandhi family, party president Mallikarjun Kharge, AICC in-charge Meenakshi Natarajan and the chief minister Revanth Reddy.

“There are speculations, but I am definitely going to contest from here,” said Azharuddin, adding that he was confident of winning the seat this time. However, the PCC chief Goud was quick to point out that the party followed a process and it is not certain about the choice till AICC announces the name of the candidate.

“First, aspirants have to apply to the PCC. We select the applications and send them to the CEC and CWC, which finalize the candidate. No matter what anyone says till then, it is not final,” Goud clarified.

Since bypolls usually go the ruling party’s way, the Congress party is hoping to win the seat this time. The support from the AIMIM adds to its confidence.