VIJAYAWADA: YSR Congress president and Chief Minister Jaganmohan Reddy sounded the election bugle, two years in advance, by aggressively attacking the opposition parties and asking the public to support him
“Support me if you trust me and feel I am doing good to you,” the CM urged the public on Sunday.
While the CM has two more years to govern and implement his welfare schemes to win back the confidence of the people, he is facing severe criticism from the opposition, mainly the Telugu Desam and the Jana Sena, and hence started a reverse attack.
The chief minister started a mass-contact programme, meeting ordinary people at public meetings. He cautioned them that if the YSRC lost power, the welfare schemes benefiting crores of people in the state will be stopped by the others -- the opposition parties. He so far addressed three public meetings and would address people on April 28 with increased pitch.
Sources close to the CM said Jagan would tour districts as frequently as possible to address public meetings. His security wing has readied two bullet-proof buses with all the facilities for the district tours. It will have attached pantry, washroom and other facilities. Jagan will conduct Rachhabanda with villagers and also visit village secretariats to directly check how they are functioning.
As Leader of Opposition, Jagan had walked 3,648km in 341 days under the Praja Sankalpa Yatra walkathon, beating his father YS Rajasekhar Reddy’s Padayatra record of 1500km and Telugu Desam chief Chandrababu Naidu’s 2,000 km. The epic Padayatra of Jagan had turned a game changer as he interacted with nearly two crore people and it resulted in the landslide victory for YSRC in the 2019 elections.
The YSRC got 1,56,88,569 votes in 2019. At present, 1.41 crore households are benefited from any one of the YSRC government’s Navaratnalu welfare schemes, which ensures Direct Beneficiary Transfer of funds into their bank accounts. Jagan is planning to consolidate maximum support from these households to YSRC in the next two years.
Senior political analysts say that CM Jagan is planning to interact and mingle with people in the coming two years to also know the ground realities, public pulse and to consolidate his support among the masses. He has already asked legislators to start house-to-house visits under the Gadapa Gadapa Ku YSRC programme to attract the people and he too would do the same.
Senior political analysts say Jana Sena founder Pawan Kalyan started yatras. TD chief Naidu I planning a Bus Yatra from May and BJP leaders are also planning to do yatras. Hence, Jagan is concentrating on the task of highlighting the government’s welfare schemes at every meeting.
The CM addressed meetings in Narasaraopet, Nandyal and Ongole where he spoke aggressively, attacking the opposition TDP, Jana Sena and others, while explaining his welfare programmes. All these show Jagan is readying for 2024 assembly and Lok Sabha elections with a positive vote.
Political analysts say Jagan did not lose any chance to provoke people against opposition and hence he is highlighting the statements of Naidu and others about ‘AP turning into Sri Lanka’ and, on the other hand, he himself explaining his government’s successes.
They noted that all welfare schemes are being implemented by the CM without fail by depositing money into the bank accounts of beneficiaries directly and the beneficiaries will not want to have a stop to this facility.
