Former YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) Rajya Sabha MP Vemireddy Prabhakar Reddy (VPR), who resigned from the party and also from the Rajya Sabha earlier in February, joined the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) on Saturday, March 2. Addressing the public after joining TDP, Vemireddy, founder and promoter of VPR Mining Infra Private Limited, said that he would contest the upcoming Lok Sabha elections from the Nellore parliament constituency. The announcement came a day after YSRCP announced V Vijaya Sai Reddy, Rajya Sabha MP and a close aide of Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, as the constituency’s leader in-charge – essentially naming him as the YSRCP candidate from Nellore. The constituency is currently represented by YSRCP’s Adala Prabhakar Reddy.
VPR joined TDP along with his wife Vemireddy Prashanti, who is also the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) local advisory committee president in Delhi. Speaking at the meeting where the couple joined the party, TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu criticised CM Jagan’s alleged autocratic rule and said, “Jagan thinks of himself as a king and everyone else as slaves.” He alleged that Jagan had mistreated several leaders from Nellore, and claimed that TDP would wrest all ten Assembly segments under the Nellore Lok Sabha constituency from the YSRCP in the upcoming elections.
Earlier on February 21, mining baron VPR in a letter to CM Jagan said he was resigning as YSRCP’s Nellore district president and also from the primary membership of the party due to personal reasons. He also stated that he was resigning as a member of the Rajya Sabha due to personal reasons. VPR had announced in the past that he would contest forthcoming Lok Sabha elections from Nellore constituency. However, he reportedly felt sidelined by the party in selecting candidates for Assembly elections.
The MP was reportedly upset that the party leadership did not even inform him about its decision to appoint Md Khaleel as the coordinator for the Nellore City Assembly constituency. Prabhakar Reddy is one of the three Rajya Sabha members from the state who will be retiring soon.
VPR’s resignation had dealt another blow to YSRCP in Nellore district. The party lost a couple of MLAs to the TDP last year. He is the fourth MP to quit YSRCP since last month. Narasaraopet MP Lavu Sri Krishna Devarayulu, Kurnool MP Sanjeev Kumar and Machilipatnam MP Vallabhaneni Balashwory resigned from the party last month after the party denied them tickets for the coming elections. On March 2, Lavu Sri Krishna Devarayalu also joined TDP at Dachepalli in the Gurazala Assembly constituency of Palnadu district.
Simultaneous elections to Andhra Pradesh Assembly and Lok Sabha are likely to be held in April-May.
Read: Defection Season in Telugu States: YSRCP, BRS MPs Jump Parties Ahead of Lok Sabha Elections
With IANS inputs