Exuding confidence of coming to power in the residuary State of Andhra Pradesh, president of YSR Congress Party Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy on Monday decided to contest only for the Assembly from Pulivendula in his native Kadapa district.
He pitched his mother Y.S. Vijayamma, who is honorary president of the party, to contest for the Visakhapatnam Lok Sabha constituency. However, Mr. Jagan Reddy’s sister Y.S. Sharmila’s name did not figure in the list as “she has decided against contesting the election long back,” as claimed by the official spokesperson of the party Vasireddy Padma.
In all, the YSRC announced its candidates for 24 Lok Sabha and 170 Assembly seats. The second list of candidates of the party for Bapatla parliamentary constituency and P. Gannavaram, Achanta, Palacole, Santhanuthalapadu and Markapuram Assembly segments are likely to be announced in a day or two.
The list comprises names of all the sitting MLAs of the party, including those disqualified under anti-defection law, with a few replacements with their family members, most of the Congress and TDP MLAs having defected to the party in the recent months, including a few former Ministers. It also consists of several names of Mr. Jagan Reddy’s kin.
Notable among the party candidates for Lok Sabha seats include industrialists Koneru Rajendra Prasad (Vijayawada) and Alla Ayodhya Rami Reddy (Narasaraopet), former bureaucrats Thota Chandrasekhar (Eluru), V. Varaprasad Rao (Tirupati) and Kothapalli Geetha (Araku) and relatives Y.V. Subba Reddy (Ongole) and Y.S. Avinash Reddy (Kadapa) and former Ministers Pinipe Viswaroop (Amalapuram) and Kolusu Parthasarthi (Machilipatnam), who defected to the party a couple of days ago.
Prominent omissions from the list include senior leaders Konathala Ramakrishna and Dadi Veerabhadra Rao. However, their kin – Konathala Raghu (Anakapalli) and Dadi Ratnakar (Visakhapatnam West) -- have been accommodated for Assembly constituencies.
Former Ministers -- Dharmana Prasada Rao, Kothapalli Subbarayudu, Mopidevi Venkataramana (all defected from Congress recently), Pilli Subhash Chandra Bose, Balineni Srinivasa Reddy and Tammineni Sitaram and Jyothula , have been given tickets to contest the elections to Assembly. Actress R.K. Roja Selvamani, sitting MLCs Jupudi Prabhakar Rao and Desai Thippa Reddy also made it to the list.
Mr. Jagan Reddy’s relatives who made it to the Assembly list include P. Ravindranath Reddy (Kamalapuram), B. Shobha Nagi Reddy (Allagadda), B. Nagi Reddy (Nandyal) and S.V. Mohan Reddy (Kurnool). Three brothers – Y. Balanagi Reddy (Mantralayam), Y. Saiprasad Reddy (Adoni) and Y. Venkatarami Reddy (Guntakal) also figured in the list.
In all, the party’s list for comprises 14 women and four minorities’ candidates for Assembly and five women candidates for Lok Sabha constituencies.
