Betting mania: After Chiru in 2009, it is Pawan now!

March 31, 2019

With the IPL and polling season underway, bookies and punters have also become active betting on winnable players and candidates. Betting is more prominently being reported from cash-rich West Godavari district, the hotbed of the illegal activity in AP, where both the Assembly and Parliamentary polls are scheduled on April 11.

Punters are placing a large amount of money at stake on who would emerge victorious as the CM of the state, TDP Chief N. Chandrababu Naidu or YSR Congress President Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy, and it seems that Jagan is the favourite. Betting is also being done at the constituency-level and on the majority margins.

According to reports, betting is intense in Gajuwaka and Bheemavaram constituencies from where actor-turned-politician and Jana Sena chief Pawan Kalyan is contesting. Punters firmly believe that Pawan would lose in Bheemavaram, even though the number of Kapu voters are more in the constituency, and are betting in crores on the same.

Bookies are reportedly promising to give Rs. 1 lakh to the punters if the Jana Sena chief wins and asking for Rs. 3 lakh , if he would lose. In Gajuwaka, the situation is different. There are lakhs of party functionaries for the JSP in this constituency and so betting is in favour of the party. Here bookies are agreeing to give Rs. 5 lakh if Pawan loses and asking for Rs. 1 lakh if he would win.

With punters betting around Rs. 1,500 crore on candidates in the recently held Telangana polls, bookies expect that bets would touch the Rs. 2,000 crore mark in AP. According to sources, a majority of the punters are placing bets on the YSRC winning and bookies are going for betting in the 1:1 ratio, which means if the punter bets Rs. 1 lakh on the TD win, he would get another Rs. 1 lakh if it wins.

Betting is also high on the Narasapur Lok Sabha seat, which has three candidates from the Kshatriya community - Raghu Ramakrishna Raju (YSRC), K. Bapiraju (Congress), Vetukuri Venkata Siva Rama Raju alias Kalavappudi Siva (TDP) and the JSP chief's brother and film actor K. Nagababu.

Keeping in view past experiences, punters are keen on this seat and many have put their money on the YSR Congress and JSP candidates in the ratios of 1:5, 1:3 and some of them in 1:2, bookies say.

Punters are betting on TDP candidates' victory in the Assembly segments of Mangalgiri (N. Lokesh), Undi, Bhimavaram, Visakhapatnam (North), Guntur, Kadapa, Rajahmundry, Bheemli, Eluru, Hindupur Assembly segments and Vijayawada, Guntur, Visakhapatnam, and Rajahmundry Lok Sabha seats.

In the 2009 polls, after the launch of Praja Rajyam Party by megastar Chiranjeevi, the brother of JSP chief Pawan Kalyan, crores of rupees had changed hands during betting, but not many did bet on the PRP. Then, the bookies announced a stake as low as 1:7. Fans who would bet in favour of Chiranjeevi would be lucky only if the PRP comes to power, as they will get seven times the money they invest.