VIJAYAWADA: Groups in the Congress that remained subdued till the exit of CPI's Tadi Sakuntala from mayoral chair have become active again and are renewing their claim for the mayor's post.

Though the party leadership in Hyderabad has selected corporator M.V. Ratna Bindu (Kapu community) of Vijayawada East MLA Vangaveeti Radhakrishna's group as candidate for the next two years, followers of Vijayawada MP Lagadapati Rajagopal are still making the last ditch effort to get their candidate Mallika Begum elected as mayor.

Even as district in-charge Minister J.C. Diwakar Reddy made it clear during his visit to the city on Tuesday that Ratna Bindu's candidature had been finalised and there was no re-thinking on it, he parried questions about the length of her tenure. The party leadership settled the issue by announcing that Ms. Ratna Bindu would be the mayor for the first two years, while Ms. Begum would take over for the remaining two years. This was done overlooking an agreement with the CPI, as per which a CPI nominee should be made mayor for one more year.

Followers of Mr. Rajagopal and Kankipadu MLA Devineni Rajasekhar, who remained quiet till Ms. Sakuntala bowed out of office, are now saying that it is only fair that the mayor's post should be rotated between all three groups. They say that Ms. Begum, a Muslim, and fourth division corporator Anne Prasanna, a Kamma and a follower of Mr. Rajasekhar, should also be given a chance. The Kapu-Kamma-Muslim-CPI formula would satisfy all sections and groups leaving little scope for any dissidence, they say.

Deputy mayor post

The three groups are fighting to capture the posts of deputy mayor and party floor leader too. Aspirants for these two posts from the Radhakrishna group will have to step out of the race because the party leadership has already named mayoral candidate from their group.

But the competition is stiff in the other two groups, with more than one corporator aspiring for the deputy mayor's post. BC leader Venkata Satyanarayana and SC leader Kalapala Ambedkar, both followers of Mr. Rajasekhar, are in the race. From the Rajagopal group, BC leader Yelakala Chalapathi Rao and SC leader Meesala Rajeswara Rao are in the race. Samanthapudi Narasaraju and Sistla Ramalingamurthy are also aspiring for either of the two posts. The election to the deputy mayor's post is linked to the election of new mayor, because deputy mayor Ch. Krishna Kumar has to officiate as mayor until the election process is over.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail