All the rich people in Jegurupadu panchayat have been visiting Pamulametta hamlet to select a sarpanch candidate as the post was reserved for ST woman.
Nomadic tribe
There are about 4,500 voters in the panchayat and STs are residing at Pamulametta. About 70 families of Yanadi, a nomadic tribe, settled about 90 years ago. They used to eke out a living by catching snakes and selling their skin. But after the Wildlife Conservation Act came into force and made sale of snakes skin a punishable offence, they started catching venomous snakes from residential areas and releasing them in the wild.
Among the 200 Yanadis, 110 registered as voters and two families belong to Yerukala community, who rears pigs. “From the last 10 days, we have been trying to identify a woman among the 110 voters suitable for the post of sarpanch and comply with all norms and rules of the Election Commission,” said Mr P. Venkateswarlu from Jegurupadu.
EC norms
The main problem in choosing the candidate for sarpanch post is the Election Commission’s norm that candidate should not have more than two children. Except seven to eight families in the village, all are having more than two children. It is a tough time for parties to choose the candidate with two children, reside in the hamlet for the last five years and also without any criminal background.
“Earlier these nomadic tribes are moving from place to place for their livelihood and from last one decade they are settled, except for a few,” said Pamulametta School headmaster Chilukuri Srinivasa Rao, who won the best teacher award twice at the State-level and transformed the village along with former sarpanch Y. Devadevana Kumari.
As a last-minute effort, Ms. Kumari who brought Nirmal Puraskar for the village and her husband Mr. Stalin are making rounds in this village to choose a candidate from Yanadis. Both are staunch supporters of the YSR Congress.
The Telugu Desam Party has already identified a candidate from Pamulametta and kept her in their `camp’. It is learnt that, on the last date of nominations that is on Saturday the Congress is going to spring a surprise by fielding its candidate from Yerukala community.
