Hyderabad, May 10: Telugu Desam president N Chandrababu Naidu has at long last decided to visit Telangana and brave any reaction he might get there. He is scheduled to tour Khammam and Nalgonda districts on May 14 and 15. It is unlikely he will say much about the Telangana question, but will concentrate on farmers’ issues.
Ever since Union Home Minister P Chidambaram made his turbulent announcement on Telangana on Dec. 9, the TDP chief has kept his distance from Telangana, even as his party leaders from that region have been pilloried by students and commoners alike for the TDP’s ambivalence on separate statehood for Telangana.
Naidu did make a foray into Ranga Reddy district, specifically Medchal on the outskirts of Hyderabad, last month, and it was not a political visit but a celebration of his 60th birthday. Even then, his event was interrupted by protests. Naidu also visited flood-hit Mahaboobnagar in March to distribute relief material to victims but T activists cornered him there too.
Now with his party’s Mahanadu coming up at the end of this month, and then byelections to vacated Assembly seats in Telangana not far off, Naidu cannot afford to give a wide berth to Telangana any longer.
For one thing, now that the intensity of the Telangana movement is seemingly not at fever pitch any more, Naidu now wants to place his cards before Telangana farmers and seek that they trust him. The wily TDP chief will also assess the present status of his party from the reception given to him in Khammam and Nalgonda.
Naidu is not the only leader who has been set upon by angry Telangana separatists. APCC president D Srinivas had a similar reception when he visited his Nizamabad constituency last month.
Telangana activists created trouble for him wherever he went, forcing him to seek a police escort.
Naidu is also not the only leader to embark upon barnstorming tours of the state in this high summer. Praja Rajyam Party president K Chiranjeevi has already done it, albeit in the safer environs of coastal Andhra, with is Polavaram yatra. Chief Minister K Rosaiah too is visiting the districts braving the sun. He has already done Nellore, Guntur, Visakhapatnam and other districts.
For its party, the Telangana Rashtra Samithi is organising its ‘Palle Yatra’ from June 3 to 10, to strengthen the party for the ensuing by-elections.
TRS chief K Chandrasekhara Rao may also tour some of the districts.
The ambitious young Congress MP Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy too is poised to launch the second leg of his Odarpu yatra in June.
—Agencies