Former Indian cricketer Y. Venugopal Rao on Thursday joined Jana Sena party of actor-politician Pawan Kalyan.
He took the membership of the party in the presence of Pawan Kalyan in Visakhapatnam. The actor's fans also joined the party on this occasion.
Venugopal Rao made his debut in one-day internationals against Sri Lanka in 2005. The middle-order batsman played 16 ODIs scoring 218 runs including a fifty. His last ODI was against West Indies in 2006.
The Andhra cricketer, who played 120 first-class matches scoring over 7,000 runs, also played for Deccan Chargers and Hyderabad Sunrisers in the Indian Premier League (IPL). His last IPL appearance was in 2014.
On the occasion, Pawan said Jana Sena had been fighting to solve people's problems. He exuded confidence that the party would come to power in Andhra Pradesh in 2019 elections.
The actor-politician is presently touring the state as part of his 'Praja Porata Yatra'.
Dubbed the Jana Sena Porata Yatra, the tour will see a mix of walkathons (padayatra), public meetings and road shows.
Pawan Kalyan said that the aim of this yatra is to highlight the issue of Special Category Status (SCS) to Andhra Pradesh and also to highlight the several promises made by the Centre during the state’s bifurcation.
The Jana Sena party chief toured Srikakulam district for several days, before entering Vizianagaram district. He is presently in Visakhapatnam district.
Earlier this week after touring the two districts in Uttarandhra, Pawan Kalyan took to Twitter and said, “Uttarandhra people are building up a strong movement for their self-respect, dignity and political -economic equality. They are not trusting the so-called ruling political classes and it is evidently visible.
He also went on to warn the state government that this sentiment it might lead to a separate statehood movement, similar to that of Telangana.
Pawan, who had campaigned for the BJP-TDP alliance in 2014 elections before falling out with them, also hopes that the tour would greatly help them when the state goes to the polls in 2019.
The actor-politician has already said that his party would contest all 175 Assembly constituencies in Andhra Pradesh during the 2019 polls.
IANS inputs