Telugu Desam Party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu seems be losing control over his party leaders, including MLAs, MPs and ministers these days. Many of them are just ignoring Naidu’s orders to participate in the government and party programmes.
It was evident from the way many TDP leaders abstained from Nava Nirmana Deeksha, a pledge supposed to be taken by all sections of people rededicating themselves for the reconstruction of the residuary Andhra Pradesh post-bifurcation.
While Naidu took it as a prestige issue and held the function in a big way at Vijayawada, at least 20 senior leaders including 13 MLAs stayed away from Nava Nirmana Deeksha in their respective constituencies.
As a result, the programme turned out to be a miserable flop in various districts of the state.
In fact, at Vijayawada, too, the local leaders did not evince much interest in mobilising crowds and those who attended the programme left midway even before Naidu administered the pledge, after one and a half hour speech.
The severe summer is also one of the reasons for the poor turnout of the programme.
Naidu, who reviewed the situation on Saturday morning, pulled up the party leaders and told them to take part in the deekshas in the coming five days.
It remains to be seen how many MLAs will listen to Naidu’s orders!
