Vijayawada: With a mission to breach the bastion of Telugu Desam Party and subsequently wrest the seat from his bete noire and leader of Opposition N Chandrababu Naidu, Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy is undertaking a trip to Kuppam on September 22. He will be launching developmental works worth Rs 66 crore on behalf of Kuppam municipality.
Reddy, who will interact with party rank and file, and address a public meeting, a month after calling upon YSRCP members to start working to win all 175 Assembly seats, is giving utmost priority to score victory in Kuppam Assembly constituency.
During his last visit in August, he went to the extent of promising a ministerial berth to K R J Bharat if he emerged victorious against Chandrababu Naidu in 2024 elections. Naidu won from the seat for the seventh time in a row in 2019. Kuppam was the only seat among 14 in undivided Chittoor which TDP was able to win in last polls. However, in the subsequent municipal, zilla parishad and mandal parishad elections, the results went totally in favour of the YSRCP leading a body blow to the yellow brigade.
Bharat, an MLC, is the son of retired IAS officer K Chandramouli. His father was the YSRCP candidate against Naidu.
The Chief Minister during last visit to Kuppam and interaction with key party functionaries at Tadepalli declared that for him Kuppam is as important as Pulivendula, his family’s traditional constituency. He also appointed minister for power Pedireddy Ramachandra Reddy as the in-charge for Kuppam to strengthen the party.
The open war declared by YSRCP led to accusation by the TDP that the ruling party was misusing official machinery to weaken the Opposition and coercing its members and activists to cross over to the ruling bandwagon. A few days ago, about 100 activists of TDP from Kuppam joined YSRCP in the presence of the Chief Minister at Tadepalli.
P V Mithun Reddy, Rajampet MP said the people of Kuppam are fed up with false promises of Chandrababu Naidu and have realised the fact that there is more visible development in the area during past three years compared to what has been done during the tenure of Chandrababu Naidu as the Chief Minister of AP post-bifurcation and before.
YSRCP registered its victory in 151 Assembly and 22 Lok Sabha seats in 2019. Now Jagan Mohan Reddy is repeatedly telling party-men that they should target to win all seats in the 2024 elections by totally eliminating TDP. However, after Prime Minister Narendra Modi met TDP national president Chandrababu Naidu briefly in New Delhi after the latter lost power in 2019, set off speculation that there could be realignment of both the parties. At present, BJP has an alliance with Pawan Kalyan’s Jana Sena. Even the actor-turned politician has been indulging in oft-repeated rhetoric that there is the need for united opposition to dislodge Jagan Mohan Reddy government.
All the Opposition parties including BJP is favouring continuation of Amaravati as the single capital of Andhra Pradesh whereas the YSRCP is strongly defending its decision for trifurcation to what it claims, to ensure decentralised development.