Hopes of a grand alliance of anti-Congress parties in Andhra Pradesh suffered yet another setback with lok Satta party deciding to go it alone in the coming elections.
The lok Satta had earlier expressed desire to be part of the TDP-BJP alliance and its president IAS officer-turned-MlA Jayprakash Narayan had also declared his support to Narendra Modi as the next Prime Minister.
But as the wrangling between the Telugu Desam Party and the BJP over seat sharing continues unabated, the lok Satta on Saturday announced its plans to contest the elections alone. Party spokesperson Katari Srinivasa Rao told the media in Hyderabad that the party will contest five to six lok Sabha constituencies and 50 to 60 Assembly seats in Telangana, 100 Assembly seats and 15 to 20 lS seats in Andhra Pradesh.
Jayprakash Narayan, who represented Kukatpally Assembly constituency till now, will be contesting from Malkajgiri lok Sabha constituency, which has become very attractive for the leaders with Andhra roots as it has a sizeable number of voters from the Seemandhra region.
The lok Satta which has already announced 14 candidates will be releasing the second list of candidates on Sunday. Secunderabad, Chevella, Warangal and Medak are the other lok Sabha parties which the party intends to contest. Giving the reasons for the change in party’s thinking on alliance, Srinivas Rao said that the silence of the other parties had forced it.
The party proposed agenda-based electoral tie-ups with the BJP and the TDP based on their performance in the 2009 general elections.“Although time is running out for filing nominations, there has been no response from those parties till now,” he said.Without taking the names of the BJP or TDP he said that other parties were not concerned about providing growth opportunities to all.“Instead, they are planning to lure voters with inducements,” he said.
In 2009 elections making its debut lok Satta had polled 1.72% of total votes and won one assembly seat. But as it largely ate in to anti Congress votes, Naidu had blamed it for his Telugu Desam party’s defeat to a large extent. The other party he blamed was Chiranjeevi’s Praja Rajyam Party which polled nearly 15.7% of votes and bagged 18 assembly seats. later he merged his party in to Congress. The margin of defeat between Congress and TDP was only 2% of the total votes polled.