Know your MLA: Raju manages to win Madakasira by a narrow margin

Madakasira : Madakasira constituency elected 42-year-old M S Raju as MLA for the first time. A graduate in Arts, he is the lucky guy who came from nowhere. TDP which selected ex-MLA K Eeranna to be its candidate for Madakasira initially, changed its stand in the last minute and fielded Raju much to the chagrin of the followers of Eeranna who was MLA from 2014-19.

Raju with no political background arrived on to the electoral stage reportedly at the intervention of Nara Lokesh. He is branded by observers as a man of Lokesh, who is the TDP national general secretary and currently a minister. Many expected Raju to lose because of last minute change effected by TDP leadership but he managed to win by a margin of just 151 votes over his YSRCP rival.

Financial assets declared by Raju suggest that he hailed from a lower middle class family. He has bank balances of only Rs1.30 lakh spread in two banks. He has gold ornaments worth less than Rs 7 lakh belonging to his wife. A wave in favour of TDP catapulted him to become an MLA. Being a lucky young man, he wants to prove himself and pay back to the people and party which made him what he is today by being on the side of people and party workers. He looks unto the TDP leadership for guidance and all cooperation for the development of the most backward Madakasira Assembly constituency.