Vijayawada: In a surprise development, former joint director of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), V.V. Lakshminarayana is likely to join the Telugu Desam in a day or two.
He is likely to be fielded from one of the Assembly segments in Visakhapatnam district, most probably Bheemili.
Mr Lakshminarayana had made his intention to join politics known a long time ago. In fact, he had planned to launch a political party on his own and has toured the state extensively over the last few months.
TD chief K. Chandrababu Naidu has finalised candidates for almost all the seats in the district except for Vizag north, Bheemili and the Vizag Lok Sabha seat, lending credence to speculation that Mr Lakshminrayana will join the party.
The calculation is that Mr Lakshminarayana will be fielded from Bheemili and the sitting MLA and minister, Ganta Srinivas Rao, will be given the Vizag Lok Sabha seat and IT minister Nara Lokesh will be fielded from the Vizag north segment.
He was also offered to lead the Lok Satta party. However, in the last few months, he has been helping farmers by floating an organisation called Join For Development.
While in the CBI, Mr Lakshminarayana handled some high-profile cases in the erstwhile combined state of Andhra Pradesh, such as the Satyam fraud, YSRC chief Jagan Mohan Reddy’s quid pro quo case and the Obulapuram mining scam.
It will be interesting to see how the political fight develops as YSRC chief Jagan Mohan Reddy’s quid pro quo case is being investigated by the CBI and he had been interrogated in the case by Mr Lakshminarayana earlier.
The TD wants to cash in on Mr Lakshminarayana’s image of a tough cop and his intolerance of corruption.
Mr Naidu may use him extensively to campaign for the party across the state.
Over the past few months, Mr Lakshminarayana has toured villages across the 13 districts and interacted with varied sections of the people, especially farmers and fishermen.
He is critical of the state of farming and farmers in AP.
He said he would prepare a people’s manifesto based on the feedback and experiences of his state-wide tour.
A 1990 batch Maharashtra cadre IPS officer, Mr Lakshminarayana was additional director general of police in Mumbai before he took voluntary retirement last year.
