A win in this by-election will be important for any party
The bypoll to Telangana's Munugode assembly seat is witnessing a close fight between the BJP and the K Chandrashekar Rao-led Telangana Rashtriya Samithi. (TRS).
According to the latest data from the Election Commission, TRS candidate Kusukuntla Prabhakar Reddy is ahead of the BJP's Komatireddy Raj Gopal Reddy by a margin of over 3,000 votes.
For Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, a win is important as this is the first election since he launched the Bharat Rashtra Samiti (BRS), declaring his national ambitions ahead of the 2024 election.
The bypoll was necessary after the resignation of Congress MLA Komatireddy Raj Gopal Reddy, who switched to the BJP earlier this year. The main contest is between the BJP's Raj Gopal Reddy, TRS candidate Kusukuntla Prabhakar Reddy and the Congress' Palvai Sravanthi.
The bypoll emerged as one of the costliest in recent times with allegations of candidates lavishing money and sops on voters.
The BJP hopes for a victory in Munugode to establish itself as the main alternative to the TRS ahead of next year's Telangana election after recent victories in the Dubbak and Huzurabad assembly bypolls and also the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) election.
For the Congress, losing Munogode will be a massive blow after its string of defeats in Telangana, including in the 2014 and 2018 state elections.