Newly-appointed Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee president Y S Sharmila, soon after assuming charge on Sunday, announced that her party would field candidates in all the 175 assembly constituencies and 25 Lok Sabha constituencies in the upcoming elections to the state assembly and Lok Sabha.
She said the process of selection of candidates will begin from Wednesday, when AICC in-charge of Andhra Pradesh affairs Manickam Tagore will accept applications from ticket aspirants.
One wonders whether Sharmila would be able to get the right potential candidates to contest at least for a dozen assembly seats and half-a-dozen Lok Sabha seats, forget about 175 assembly and 25 Lok Sabha seats.
She is apparently pinning hopes on several senior leaders who were earlier associated with the Congress during the regime of her father and former chief minister late Y S Rajasekhar Reddy.
She hopes that those leaders who were not happy in the YSR Congress party, might evince interest in returning to the party.
On Sunday, Mangalagiri MLA Alla Ramakrishna Reddy, who had resigned from the YSR Congress party in December, joined the Congress.
Another YSRCP MLA from Rayadurgam in Anantapur district Kapu Ramachandra Reddy, who had met former APCC president N Raghuveera Reddy, is also expected to join the Congress.
YSR’s close aide and former MP K V P Ramachandra Rao is said to have plunged into action to attract important leaders from other parties into the Congress. He might succeed in bringing a few leaders.
Starting Tuesday, Sharmila is embarking on a whirlwind tour of the entire state to interact with the party leaders across the state and review the party position.
She would begin her tour from Itchapuram in Srikakulam district on the borders of Odisha on Tuesday and end it at Idupulapaya in Kadapa district on January 31.
Sharmila will review the party situation in each district, activate the party cadre and also attract important Congress leaders who had been staying away from the party for the last 10 years, back into the party.
It remains to be seen how far she will succeed in finding the candidates for contesting on behalf of the Congress.
