The Hindu : Padala faces threat from partymen

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Mar 23, 2004

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Others

Padala faces threat from partymen

By Harpal Singh

ADILABAD, MARCH 22. The Adilabad Assembly constituency has turned into a Telugu Desam Party bastion after its candidate won the 1994 elections for the first time. In the next elections in 1999, Padala Bhumanna, the TDP candidate, registered a resounding win over former Minister and senior Congressman, C. Ramachandra Reddy.

For recording a win by a hefty margin of 35,000 votes, Mr. Bhumanna was rewarded with the Ministry of Handlooms and Textiles. However, in course of time, his partymen turned against him and represented to the party president and Chief Minister, N. Chandrababu Naidu, against renominating him in the ensuing election. Their grouse was that Mr Bhumanna was not evincing interest in party affairs and failed to initiate development works in the constituency.

In the 11 elections held so far for the Assembly seat, independents have won four times, the Progressive Democratic Front, Congress and TDP twice each and Communist Party of India once.

Only after the freedom movement, Adilabad came on to the scene on the political front and the Left parties got a foothold. The Leftist-PDF candidate, Daji Shankar Rao, won from Adilabad in the first Assembly elections of 1952. In 1957 too, the PDF won with its candidate, Ranganath Rao, romping home.

In 1962, Vittal Rao, an Independent won the Adilabad seat followed by the CPI's Kastal Ramkishtu. The Congress could register its first win only in 1972, with Masood Ahmed Khursheed winning the election. In 1978, C. Ramachandra Reddy won as an independent followed by C. Waman Reddy who also won as an independent in the 1983 elections. During the 1960s and 1970s, politics in Adilabad centred around the late C. Bhoja Reddy, a formidable local leader. He was the father of Mr. Waman Reddy and uncle of Mr. Ramachandra Reddy and above all, a `king-maker.' He was instrumental in putting up candidates as independents and ensuring their victories.

In 1985, Mr. Ramachandra Reddy won again as an independent. He followed it up with another victory in the 1989 elections. He was made Minister for Irrigation and later Marketing. However, in 1994, Mr. Ramachandra Reddy, who fought the election on a Congress ticket, lost to Mr. Waman Reddy. This election also saw Mr. Bhumanna contesting as a TDP rebel candidate. He could muster 34,455 votes against Mr. Waman Reddy's 39,729.

The emergence of Mr. Bhumanna as a political strongman was a fallout of an `anti-Reddy' feeling taking roots since the late 1980s. In Adilabad, the Backward Class votes number 60,000 according to independent estimates. They had stayed divided until the 1994 elections. Being a BC himself, Mr. Bhumanna derived his votes from this section. Of late, he is faced with stiff resistance from his own partymen.

The decline in the TDP's popularity and Telangana Rashtra Samiti's gain was attributed to his failure in taking up development works. The anti-Bhumanna lobby cites the example of the last local body elections in which TDP candidates won all the five Zilla Parishad Territorial Constituencies. However, the TDP vote accounted for 40,153 while the combined vote of TRS and Congress in these elections was 46,566.

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