VIPs scare away rivals

Hyderabad March 16: Ticket aspirants are crowding all party offices but there are no takers for VIP constituencies.
Enquiries revealed there is no jostling for Pulivendla held by the Chief Minister, Dr Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy, Kuppam, the constituency of the Telugu Desam chief, Mr N. Chandrababu Naidu, and Kadapa, which is being given to Mr Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy.
Similar is the case with Tirupati, from where the Praja Rajyam chief Chiranjeevi is likely to contest, Karimnagar, the fiefdom of the TRS chief, Mr K. Chandrasekhar Rao and Hyderabad, where Mr Asaduddin Owaisi holds sway.
Dr Reddy, who entered active politics in 1978, has entered the Assembly four times and the Lok Sabha an equal number of times. He won all the elections he contested.
“No one in the Congress party has sought the ticket for this constituency,” chuckled a Congress leader.
Even Opposition leaders are scared to contest against him.
The Telugu Desam leader, Mr Satish Reddy, took him on twice in the past and is likely to contest against him again. “I had to pay a heavy price for contesting against him,” he said.
Mr Naidu, a political “batchmate” of Dr Reddy was elected as MLA for the first time in 1978 from Chandragiri and later shifted to Kuppam in 1989.
From 1989 to 2004, he has been been winning regularly from Kuppam.
Though the Congress is trying hard to reduce his influence in Kuppam, there is no match for Mr Naidu even today.
And after it became known that Praja Rajyam chief Chiranjeevi plans to contest from Tirupati, aspirants from other parties stopped seeking a ticket for this constituency. Similarly, the Speaker, Mr K.R. Suresh Reddy has no rivals worth a name in Balakonda, the APCC president, Mr D. Srinivas, in Nizamabad, Mr Yerrannaidu in Srikakulam and Mr Botsa Satyanarayana in Vizianagaram.