Chandrababu Naidu lays more focus on Kuppam

Tirupati: After the humiliating defeat in the recent Kuppam municipal elections, TDP national president N Chandrababu Naidu will be visiting his constituency for three days beginning Thursday in a damage control attempt. He last visited Kuppam town on October 29 and 30 before the municipal elections and campaigned for his party candidates.

Ruling YSRCP dashed all the hopes of the TDP and defeated it to capture the municipality in its first ever elections. TDP had to face similar humiliation from the ruling party in the gram panchayat and mandal and zilla parishad elections held earlier during the year. Following the successive defeats in its stronghold, TDP cadres have been demoralised in a big way.

The ruling party has been going aggressively in the constituency in its attempts to demoralise the TDP chief Naidu himself and made its leader K Bharath as MLC to enable him participate in all official programmes. YSRCP leaders have gone a few steps ahead and challenged Naidu to contest again in Kuppam in the next elections only to face a huge defeat from where he won seven times consecutively so far.

On the other hand, TDP local cadres were said to be unhappy with the local leadership saying that they were not standing by them in difficult times. At the time of Naidu's visit after the defeat in gram panchayat elections in February, there was a ruckus within the party about this particular aspect. However, Naidu pacified the cadres and said that he will personally monitor all the matters and will be available to the cadres.

In particular, the party could not digest the defeat in the municipal elections. There were fears in the party circles that if the ruling party applies the same tactics in the next Assembly elections as well, Naidu has to face rough weather.

There is an argument that if the ruling party makes Naidu to focus more on his own seat in Kuppam than all other seats in the state, that itself would be a major achievement for them. Against this backdrop, Naidu's visit assumed significance. He decided to tour extensively in all the villages and want to mingle with the people to regain their confidence. Party leaders said that he may visit the constituency more often hereafter which will send positive signals to the party cadre. He may focus on the new leadership at the gram panchayat level to further strengthen the party.