YSR Congress party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy has released the complete list of candidates for 175 MLA seats and 25 MP seats for the upcoming assembly and Lok Sabha elections in the state.
At the same time, Telugu Desam Party president and former CM N Chandrababu Naidu released the list of 128 assembly seats and is all set to release the list of 17 MP seats any time.
He is left to announce the names for the remaining 14 assembly seats, after leaving the rest to his allies – Bharatiya Janata Party and Jana Sena Party which might release their lists in a day or two.
But some names which were doing rounds to be part of these lists are conspicuously missing. For example, there was a lot of talk about Jagan giving the party ticket to popular Tollywood comedian Ali.
The party leaders had been leaking to the media that Ali would be fielded from Nandyal or Kurnool or Hindupur Lok Sabha seats or any other assembly seats like Guntur (East) or even Rajahmundry.
Yet, when the final list was out, Ali’s name was nowhere to be seen. The actor, who was regularly visible in the media saying he was ready to contest from any constituency, has not been visible since then.
Same is the fate of prominent Kapu leader and former MLA Vangaveeti Radhakrishna. Though he is technically in the Telugu Desam Party, there have been a lot of speculations that he would be defecting to the YSR Congress party.
Senior YSRC leaders Kodali Nani and Vallabhaneni Vamsi held several rounds of talks with Vangaveeti, giving a projection that he has almost been given the party ticket from one of the seats in Vijayawada. His name was also tipped for Machilipatnam Lok Sabha seat at one stage.
But, his name, too, is missing in the YSRCP list. Now the talk is that he has reopened his channels with the TDP leadership and is negotiating for a party ticket, but there has been no response from Naidu or Lokesh so far.
On Tuesday, Vangaveeti met Jana Sena Party political affairs committee chairman Nadendla Manohar, leading to the speculation that he is also making alternative arrangements for a ticket from Jana Sena. Let us wait and what his fate would be there.
