Local Congmen out to defeat ‘outsiders’ in AP

By M H Ahssan

The delimitation factor and the Congress imposing ‘outsiders’ in several constituencies have combined to brew a lethal combination for the ruling party. By preliminary estimates, in at least 50 assembly and half-a-dozen Lok Sabha constituencies, the local leaders and their followers have decided to ensure the defeat of the official Congress nominees.

In most of these constituencies, the Congress has sidelined local leaders who have worked in the area for years and instead, given tickets to rank outsiders who in many cases are not even members of the party. “Therefore, unlike the rebel who contests as an independent against the official candidate, our leaders are not contesting the polls, but silently working for the defeat of the official Cong re s s n o m i - nees,” one leader said.

One reason for plotting the defeat of the official candidates is that if the outsider nominee does manage to win, then he would claim that the seat as his own in the future elections. “The only way we can ensure that our leader gets back the seat is to defeat the official candidate,” said followers of a leader from the city who has been denied a ticket for the assembly.

Take the Shadnagar assembly seat, the Congress has nominated Pratap Reddy, who is hardly known in the party circles, while denying the ticket to K Srinivas Goud, a staunch party worker and a sarpanch of Kottur village. Goud and his men are working for the defeat of Pratap. “Shadnagar is basically a BC-dominated seat. If Pratap Reddy wins, in the future, he would have the first right to stake claim to the seat and our leader and the BCs would have to forget contesting,” Goud’s followers said.

Similarly, the Congress has thrust outsiders in the Malkajgiri Lok Sabha constituency and Ambarpet assembly seats. While Sitting Siddipet MP Sarve Satyanarayana has been fielded from the Malkajgiri LS seat, minister Md Fareeduddin has been moved from Medak to the Amberpet assembly constituency. “While there may be other reasons for pitting Fareeduddin, a weak outsider, against BJP’s G Kishan Reddy, disappointed local aspirants and their followers in both the seats are fiercely against the official candidate’s victory,” said a leader.

Rajya Sabha MP and veteran city leader V Hanumantha Rao (VHR) had tried very hard for the Malkajgiri Lok Sabha seat. However, he was unsuccessful. Sources said VHR does not want to contribute a bit to the victory of these two candidates and has reportedly turned down many telephone requests from chief minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy to campaign for Fareeduddin in Amberpet, a seat where the MP lives and wields enormous clout.

In the Telangana region, local Congress leaders are said to be working for the defeat of official Sircilla assembly seat nominee G Manjula, who defected from the TDP recently. For Husnabad assembly, the Congress has fielded Pravin Reddy of Husnabad who is hardly known to local leaders. For the Nalgonda LS seat, the Congress has nominated G Sukhender Reddy over DCC president Mallesh Goud. Sukhender had quit the TDP and joined the Congress just a few days before his nomination was announced. In all these instances, a silent revolt is brewing in the Congress.

In Nagarkurnool LS constituency, the candidature of Mandha Jagannatham, who shifted loyalties from the TDP, has not gone down well with the local leaders. In the Andhra region, the Congress has imposed outsiders in Visakhapatnam (D Purandeshwari), Bapatla (Panabaka Lakshmi) and Balasouri (Narasaraopet). “Why should we work for a non-local,” is the common refrain.