Testing time for sitting MLAs in Krishna

Interestingly, the 2009 elections had also given equal representation for the Congress and TD in the Lok Sabha seats, with the latter retaining the Vijayawada and the former wresting the Machilipatnam.

The TD had done better home work, particularly in caste polarisation and had wrested the Kaikaluru Assembly seat as well as the Machilipatnam Lok Sabha seat from the Congress.

The fishermen community at Kaikaluru backed the TD’s Jayamangalam Venkata Ramana for the Assembly segment, the BC rallied together around the party’s Gowda candidate, Konakalla Narayana Rao at Machilipatnam and elected their man for the Lok Sabha for first time. Now, five years later, there is a big question mark over the future of the two leaders. While the party re-nominated Konakalla from Machilipatnam LS seat, the fate of Jayamangalam hangs in balance with the legislator involved in a family dispute with his wife and thus becoming unpopular. The party is likely to drop him this time as it had already dropped its sitting MLA Dasari Venkata Balavardhana Rao at Gannavaram for different reasons. The party had named its young leader, Vallabhaneni Vamsi Mohan from this seat. The TD, which had won the Avanigadda seat in 2009, suffered a heavy loss with the untimely death of sitting MLA Ambati Brahmanaiah. Though the party had retained the seat in the 2013 by-election with Brahmanaiah’s son Srihariprasad winning, the party is said to be looking for better candidate to drop its six-month old legislator.

As far as the other sitting MLAs of the TD are concerned, Devineni Umamaheswara Rao at Mylavaram, Sriram Rajagopal at Jaggaiahpet and Tangirala Prabhakara Rao at Nandigama, are seeking re-election from their respective seats. The TD had lost two potential sitting MLAs, Kodali Srivenkateswara Rao (Nani) of Gudivada and Chinnam Ramakotaiah of Nuzvid. While Kodali jumped into the YSR Congress, Chinnam had distanced himself with the party for a long time and joined the Congress very recently. Both the YSR Congress and the Congress are likely to re-nominate their new entrants for their respective seats.

The situation is different for the Congress sitting MLAs. Perni Venkatramaiah (Nani) is seeking re-election from his Machilipatnam segment on YSR Congress ticket, while his neighbour Jogi Ramesh of Pedana has moved to his native, Mylavaram, also on YSR Congress. The lone woman legislator, Dirisam Padma Jyothi from Tiruvur SC reserved constituency is nowhere to be seen these days. While Vellampalli is said to be joining the TD, Vishnu is believed to be weighing several options like shifting to YSR Congress or BJP or continuing in Congress.

The former minister and sitting MLA from Penamaluru, K P Saradhi, had joined the YSR Congress in the eleventh hour and it is not clear whether he would seek re-election from his home constituency or move to other place. The only legislator available for the Congress seeking re-election is D Y Das of Pamarru SC reserved constituency.