As the battle lines are drawn for the assembly and Lok Sabha elections in Andhra Pradesh, all the political parties are busy in the selection of their respective party candidates for the big contest.
The YSR Congress party led by chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy has more or less finalised the list of candidates, dropping a few and changing the constituencies of a few other candidates.
So is the case with the Telugu Desam Party led by former chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu, who is said to have finalised the list of candidates, but he is waiting for the finalisation of alliance with the Jana Sena Party led by power star Pawan Kalyan.
Of course, the Bharatiya Janata Party is yet to take a call on the alliance, let alone the selection of candidates. The Congress, too, is not yet ready, though it has no stakes in the elections at all.
Setting apart the selection of candidates, there is complete clarity on the constituencies where important leaders of the YSRCP and the TDP are contesting.
While Jagan is obviously contesting from Pulivendula, Naidu will contest from Kuppam, his son Lokesh from Mangalagiri and brother-in-law Nandamuri Balakrishna from Hindupur.
They have been nurturing their constituencies right from the beginning and regularly paying a visit to these places to keep in touch with the electorate.
Even when these leaders are busy with the public meetings and roadshows elsewhere, they are making it a point to visit their constituencies at least once in a month.
But, strangely, Jana Sena Party chief Pawan Kalyan has not been making any such attempt.
First of all, he doesn’t have clarity on which constituency he is going to contest; or at least, the people do not know where he is going to contest from.
Secondly, Pawan is not able to understand the importance of nurturing a constituency – he has to set up an office there and appoint a strategy team which will go into the people and establish him as a candidate.
Thirdly, Pawan has to visit the constituency as frequently as possible. For example, if he has chosen Bhimavaram, his campaign team must have gone into the people already and take up a massive campaign on his behalf; and Pawan should have regularly visited the town to interact with the various sections of people who matter in the elections.
But till now, there is no such clarity from Pawan Kalyan. The elections are due in another two to two-and-a-half months and still, he has no constituency of his own and his party leaders have no clue how to go about with the campaigning.
If the power star thinks he can win the election easily without going to the constituency, it is better he remembers what had happened to him in 2019 in Bhimavaram and Gajuwaka!
