BJP at its best in Seemandhra since 1950

For the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), May 16 was a red-letter day as it had for the first time won four MLA seats in Coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema districts after a gap of decades.

It was also the highest number of MLA seats that the party had won since 1952 in 13 districts which comprise the residuary State of Andhra Pradesh.

The four winners in this election are Vishnu Kumar Raju (Visakhapatnam North), A. Satyanarayana (Rajahmundry City), P. Manikyala Rao (Tadepalligudem) and Kamineni Srinivasa Rao (Kaikalur). The party had six BJP MLAs and two from the erstwhile Bharatiya Jana Sangh (BJS) in Seemandhra up to 2004. The total number of BJP MLAs has gone up to 10 with Friday’s results.

The last time when BJP had made its mark in Seemandhra was in 2004 when Pendem Dorababu defeated K.V. Mohan Rao in Pithapuram constituency of East Godavari district and subsequently joined the Congress in pursuit of his personal goals.

Ayyaji Vema won Nagaram constituency in the same district by drubbing K. Krishna Murthy of the Congress in 1999. This was the year when the lone MLA of the BJP had in Krishna district actor Kota Srinivasa Rao defeated the sitting Congress MLC Ilapuram Venkaiah.

BJP former president and Rajya Sabha member M. Venkaiah Naidu defeated Mekapati Rajamohan Reddy of the Congress in Udayagiri constituency in Nellore district in 1983.

Visakhapatnam and Anantapur districts had one BJP MLA each in K. Haribabu (he defeated Sabbam Hari in 1999) and M.S. Parthasarathy (defeated C.A. Rasool in 1999 in Kadiri).

There were two MLAs representing the Bharatiya Jana Sangh in 1967 in Nellore (A. Madhava Rao) and V. Rama Rao (Vizianagaram). Srikakulam, Guntur, Chittoor, Kurnool and Kadapa districts never had the BJP or BJS MLAs.

Tie-up with TDP

The BJP’s victory march in these elections would not be possible without ‘Modi wave’ and its alliance with the Telugu Desam Party striking the chord with electorate who were apparently disenchanted with the non-performance of the Congress government and upset with State bifurcation. It was in essence the ‘domino effect’ that worked in their favour so conspicuously .