Tirupati: Row over new districts comes to the fore again

Tirupati: As the news of move to divide districts to make each parliamentary constituency a district has gone viral after a lull, the limits of each district have become a fresh topic of discussion and speculation.

Several parliamentary constituencies are spread over two districts and under the new concept, the existing Assembly constituencies of one district will have to go into another district which may cause severe inconvenience to the people.

With the idea of making each parliamentary constituency as a district, Chittoor parliamentary constituency may have no problem as all its Assembly segments are in Chittoor district only. However, problems will arise in making Tirupati and Rajampet districts. The people of four Assembly segments – Madanapalli, Thamballapalle, Punganur and Piler – which are now in Chittoor district are part of Rajampet constituency.

Being the largest revenue division in the country, the people there were insisting on to set up of district headquarters at Madanapalle only and not at Rajampet. Some activists have formed 'Madanapalle Jilla Sadhana Samithi' (MJSS) and held protests continuously for 596 days which were stopped last year following Covid guidelines.

MJSS convenor P T M Siva Prasad told The Hans India that they now got ready to start the agitation from 597th day on the Republic Day with 'Tiranga yatra'. He said that various political parties, citizens, public organisations, students, employees, journalists and others have supported the agitation in the past and appealed to them to continue the same even now.

Still, MJSS feels that though the name of the district may be Rajampet, headquarters will be set up at Madanapalle only or else, they want to continue their agitations till the next elections to make it a big issue then. Even Rayachoti people were seeking headquarters to be set up in their town as it is almost at an equidistance from Madanapalle and Rajampet.

Similarly, four Assembly segments – Sarvepalli, Gudur, Sullurpet and Venkatagiri – of Tirupati Lok Sabha constituency will fall under the proposed Tirupati district. The new headquarters will be at a distant location to the people of those four segments. Especially, several parts of Sarvepalli are almost linked with Nellore city.

Some areas of Tirupati rural which are part and parcel of Tirupati urban come under Chandragiri constituency and they will be part of Chittoor district instead of Tirupati district. To cite an example, Tiruchanur which is almost merged with Tirupati will go into Chittoor district.

Panchayat raj minister Peddireddi Ramachandra Reddy's Punganur constituency will become a part of Rajampet district. Except for YSRCP, all other political parties seem to have psychologically prepared for the new districts and appointed parliamentary-wise office bearers. However, when the official announcement on the new districts is made by the government, it will definitely stir the hornet's nest as the objections over geographical disadvantages may flare up.