With the demand for Kapu reservations once again snowballing into a major political issue following the recent statement by YSR Congress party president Y S Jaganmohan Reddy, power star and Jana Sena Party chief Pawan Kalyan has come under pressure to disclose his stand on the issue.
Hitherto, Pawan has not come out with any statement giving clarity as to what his ideas were about the demand for reservations to Kapus under Backward Classes quota.
He always sought to disassociate himself from the Kapu agitations in the past, as he did not want to be identified with just Kapu community as had happened in case of his brother megastar Chiranjeevi.
Secondly, Pawan was moving closely with the Telugu Desam Party till recently and he did not want to antagonise chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu.
The only statement he had made in this regard was to appeal to the chief minister to fulfil his commitment for the Kapu community.
Now that the issue is gaining a lot of political importance in the run-up to the coming assembly elections, Pawan is compelled to come out with a stand, as he is now touring the Kapu hinterland of West and East Godavari districts.
He, however, is trying to play safe on the Kapu reservations demand by trying to throw the blame on Naidu and Jagan.
At a meeting of the Jana Sena Party’s political affairs committee held in Hyderabad, Pawan tried to wash off his hands on the Kapu quota controversy in the name of constituting an expert committee to look into the reservations issue.
Without referring to the demand of Kapus, Pawan said this committee would examine the legitimate demands of various sections of the society for reservations and come out with a policy that would give a practical solution to the demands.
“The ruling TDP and YSR Congress party are trying to use the demand for their political one-upmanship war,” he said.
But by making such vague announcements without specifically talking about Kapu quota issue, one doubts whether Pawan would be able to gain anything out of the current controversy.
