It was curtains for the high-decibel campaign by the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and the Congress for the bypoll to the Tirupati Assembly constituency slated for Friday, on Wednesday evening. The public addressing system stopped blaring and the tired party activists stayed indoors after a fortnight-long hectic campaign.
The TDP camp ended the electioneering with a mammoth rally taken out from NTR Circle to Sri Krishna Devaraya Circle, with an impressive number of women participating in it.
District Minister B. Gopalakrishna Reddy, Chittoor MP N. Sivaprasad, former Minister G. Muddukrishnama Naidu and district party president G. Srinivasulu appealed voters to support their party candidate M. Suguna to realise the dreams of deceased MLA M. Venkatramana to make Tirupati a mega city.
Expressing solidarity, BJP leaders K. Santha Reddy, G. Bhanuprakash Reddy and K. Ajay Kumar also took part in the campaign. The TDP received a shot in the arm with various social and caste groups including the Tirupati Modaliyar Sangam, Tirupati Tamil Sangam and Tirupati Brahmana Samajam expressing support to the party.
PCC President N. Raghuveera Reddy conducted the campaign in the suburban Jeevakona area along with the party candidate R. Sreedevi, former MP Chinta Mohan and party observer from Tamil Nadu S. Tirunavukkarasar. Speaking to the media, he flayed Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu for trying to make Ms. Suguna a ‘scapegoat’ in the by-poll.
“Mr. Naidu is doing to Ms. Suguna what Narendra Modi had done to Kiran Bedi in Delhi,” he said.
