With just a few hours left for the expansion and reshuffling of the Chandrababu Naidu cabinet, political speculations have gone to their peak in the media circles, based on the inputs flowing in from the Telugu Desam Party ranks.
Naidu is raking his brains on additions and deletions in the cabinet and has been under tremendous pressure from the aspirants, lobbyists and even those who are hell bent on spoiling the chances of their political rivals locally.
While leaders like Dhulipala Narendra, Payyavula Kesav, Kala Venkat Rao and Jyothula Nehru have been lobbying for berths, some others like Ramsubha Reddy who have been bringing pressure on Naidu not to give cabinet berths to defectors like Adinarayan Reddy.
According to information received so far, Naidu might axe at least six ministers and induct 26 others into the Cabinet.
Among those who are likely to face the axe are: Kimidi Mrinalini, Peethala Sujatha, Ravela Kishore Babu, Bojjala Gopalakrishna Reddy, Palle Raghunath Reddy and Kollu Ravindra.
Naidu might also go in for large scale reshuffle of the portfolios, so that he would have a full-fledged cabinet so that he would go to the next polls with this strong team.
It is learnt that Nandamuri Balakrishna who has been serving the Hindupur constituency since two and half years is also seeking cabinet berth, apart from his son-in-law Lokesh Babu.
Anantapur district leaders Parthasarathi, Kalwa Srinivasulu, Payyavula Keshav, Chand Basha are also said to be in contention to the minister's post.
