Hyderabad:  If early trends and results of the Telangana by-elections are anything to go by, K Chandrashekhar Rao (KCR) can stop holding his breath.

His Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) has won two seats and is leading in nine others. That is 11 out of 12, if all convert into wins.

The TRS has won the Dharmapuri and Siddipet seats, the latter by a huge margin of 95,000 votes. The party spared no effort to try and win back the 10 seats it had resigned knowing well that any setback would severely dent KCR's standing in the region.

Counting of votes began this morning for the by-elections held for 12 Assembly seats in the Telangana region on July 27.

Elections were necessitated by one BJP, one TDP and 10 TRS MLAs resigning in February this year to bolster their demand for a separate Telangana state.
 
The fate of Andhra Pradesh Congress president D Srinivas and KCR's son K T Rama Rao among others is being decided. Srinivas contested from Nizamabad Urban and is trailing by a substantial margin. A loss will be a big blow to the Congress.
 
For Srinivas, who fancies himself as a future Chief Minister and has been counting on a win here as a step towards fulfilling that ambition, this is make or break. 
 
KT Rama Rao sought re-election from Sircilla, a seat he had won by a margin of just 171 votes last year.

KCR, the TRS chief and the man whose agitation eight months ago set the stage for the latest unrest in Telangana, said before votes were cast, "Including D Srinivas, all 12 Congress candidates should lose their deposit. Only then will Sonia Gandhi realise the heat of the Telangana sentiment."

This election sees KCR with a new political friend yet again, the BJP. Only a year ago he had joined hands with Chandrababu Naidu for the Lok Sabha 2009 battle and in 2004, had fought alongside the Congress.

Source: NDTV