Why buzz about Ganta Srinivasa Rao joining the YSRCP has enthused its cadres in Vizag

Behind the News is your round up of musings from the corridors of power. Read what goes on behind the scenes for news & newsmakers.

BySouth First Desk

Published Nov 29, 2022 | 12:53 PMUpdatedApr 07, 2023 | 10:36 PM

Ganta srinivasa Rao

If reports are to be believed, YSRCP supremo and Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy has green-signalled the entry into the party of former minister and Kapu giant from Vizag, Ganta Srinivasa Rao. If true, YSRCP cadres in the coastal city have many reasons to cheer.

Ganta Srinivasa Rao has never faced defeat in his more-than-two-decade political career. And that is because he has an unerring ability to gauge the public mood, and ascertain which way the wind is blowing.

Anticipating Jagan’s wave in 2019, Srinivasa Rao had then tried to join YSRCP, but the move did not fructify for several reasons and because of prevailing equations.

It is a measure of his clout in his constituency — Vizag North — and region, that his was one of the only 23 seats the TDP won across the state. He clearly had the ability to hold his own against what was a strong Jagan wave.

Earlier, of the 18 seats the Chiranjeevi-founded Praja Rajyam won in the 2009 polls, four were from Vizag district — among them was the one Ganta Srinivasa Rao contested from, while the three others were won by his aides.

Srinivasa Rao later served as minister in the Congress government by virtue of the Praja Rajyam merging in the grand old party.

After the state’s bifurcation and just before the 2014 election, he returned to the TDP, where he had started his political career, and won. He served as a minister in the N Chandrababu Naidu’s Cabinet between 2014 and 2019.

If Srinivasa Rao joins the YSRCP, it will be a huge blow to the TDP in north Andhra, especially as the Opposition party is already on the backfoot there over its stance against making Vizag the executive capital of the state, as envisaged under Jagan’s three-capitals plan.

Srinivasa Rao is known to be a shrewd politician and is reputed to be good at poll management — as is evident from his no-loss record. Interestingly, he never contests from the same constituency twice.