Jana Sena Party(JSP) activists from the Visakhapatnam South Assembly constituency have strongly reacted to the speculation that the party high command is planning to give the ticket to JSP city president and MLC Vamsi Krishna Srinivas Yadav. They demanded that the JSP high command give the party ticket only to locals. They also questioned Mr. Yadav on how he can start claiming as the candidate, when the high command has not even officially made any announcement.
“In the last 10 to 15 years, Mr. Yadav has been working in the Visakhapatnam East Assembly constituency only. He had contested the elections twice and lost. In one of the defeats in 2014, he had lost with a difference of over 50,000 votes,” said JSP corporator (Ward 39) from South Constituency, Mohammed Sadiq, addressing a press conference at the VJF Press Club here on Monday.
Mr. Sadiq alleged that Mr. Vamsi Krishna Srinivas Yadav had never worked on issues pertaining to the South constituency. “Since the JSP is contesting only 21 seats and the aim is to win all of them, the high command should rethink about the decision. The probability of Mr. Yadav’s victory is not even 1%,” he said.
JSP leader M. Srinivas, who accompanied Mr. Sadiq, said that there are a number of JSP leaders who have been working hard for the development of the constituency and are with the people since decades. The JSP high command must think of giving tickets to locals. Here the opposition YSRC party candidate is a local and belong to fisherman community and is the sitting MLA and had won a couple of times, Mr. Srinivas said.
Present Visakhapatnam South MLA Vasupalli Ganesh Kumar, who won as a Telugu Desam Party (TDP) candidate, had shifted to YSRCP a few years ago. He is unbeaten since the 2014 elections. During the 2009 elections, Mr. Ganesh Kumar had contested as the TDP candidate, but was defeated by Dronamraju Srinivasa Rao who contested as the Congress Party candidate.
Former MLA Gandi Babjee was the TDP South Constituency in-charge for the past few years. Following the speculation of allotment of the seat to the JSP, Mr. Babjee expressed his unhappiness.
