Jagan Wants To Win Those 3 Seats At Any Cost!

Speaking at a summit yesterday, YS Jagan revealed his intention of countering the prevailing anti-incumbency through the shuffling of MLA and MP candidates. But at the same time, he is reportedly focused on winning 3 crucial MLA seats at any cost and these 3 seats are not regular ones, but VVIP segments. The 3 constituencies are Kuppam, Hindupur, and Mangalagiri.

TDP boss Chandra Babu’s Kuppam has been a target for Jagan in the last 5 years and he deployed Peddireddy Ramachandra Reddy here to run the internal politics. YCP has MLC Bharath as the candidate here and he has been working hard at the ground level for the last 5 years.

Peddireddy’s presence is also boosting YCP here. However, Kuppam is a fortress of Chandra Babu and it is nearly impossible to even come face-to-face with him here. Babu won Kuppam a record 7 times and is on the brink of making it 8 this term. But YCP is trying its best anyway through local candidate Bharath and the veteran Peddireddy.

Coming to Hindupur, YCP is likely to field a BC candidate, Koduri Deepika from here to cash on the BC vote bank. But Nandamuri Balakrishna too is active in Hindupur and is accessible to the public at all times, so there is no anti-incumbency as such. Barring any miracle, Hindupur win should be a cakewalk for Balakrishna this term. But again, Jagan is using Peddireddy to run the local politics here. YCP is trying hard to bring the TDP cadre and local leaders to their side.

Lastly, there is Mangalagiri which is confirmed to be contested by Nara Lokesh. After a defeat from here in 2019, Lokesh is hell-bent on winning this seat at any cost. YCP doesn’t even have the services of All Ramakrishna Reddy who won from here in 2014 and 19 as he left the party and joined Congress. YCP has to bring a new candidate here and then lead a campaign with him, and eventually bring him neck to neck with Lokesh. This is a labor-intensive process.

So Lokesh is naturally at an advantage here as he has been with the Mangalagiri public for the last 5 years even after the defeat. However, Jagan is seeing to it that YCP has a good campaign here in 2024 as well. He has reportedly deployed Vijayasai Reddy for the job and he is working round the clock to lead a thumping campaign for YCP. After playing a key role in bringing Kesineni Nani into YCP, Vijayasai is handed Mangalagiri duties.

These 3 hotspots are very important for TDP as they have three of the top leaders in TDP in the contest here. So Jagan is reportedly focusing on these constituencies to try and damage the framework of TDP here. But this is a challenge so much tougher than it looks.