When Telugu Desam Party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu parted ways with the Bharatiya Janata Party and came out of the National Democratic Alliance government at the Centre in April, there was a talk that he would get rid of his media advisor Parakala Prabhakar sooner or later.
Reason: Parakala happens to be the husband of senior BJP leader and Union defence minister Nirmala Sitaraman. Since Parakala reportedly got into Naidu’s inner circle only because of Nirmala, Naidu might show the door to him as it is always dangerous to have a person with BJP connections in his core team.
Lending credence to this talk, Parakala also was not visible in and around Naidu for quite some time and was not accessible to the media persons.
Adding to the speculations of his exit, during the recent Collectors’ conference, Naidu had introduced one person Sanjay Arora as his Communications Consultant, who would take care of the publicity affairs of the government.
This was believed to be the proverbial last straw for Parakala.
However, surprisingly, Parakala surfaced at the just concluded Mahanadu, the TDP’s annual conclave held at Vijayawada along with AP state planning board vice-chairman Ch Kutumba Rao.
Parakala was seen sitting right behind Naidu, noting down the key points and exchanging notes with Naidu. He was found giving slips with important comments to Naidu now and then.
And Sanjay Arora is nowhere to be seen in the picture. Inquiries revealed that Parakala managed to get back into Naidu’s inner circle and Naidu reportedly asked Sanjay to report to Parakala for all communication-related issues.
Apparently, Sanjay, a non-Telugu, does not know head or tail of Andhra affairs and he managed to get into Naidu’s circle through Nara Lokesh.
And very soon Naidu realised that Sanjay does not fit into his scheme of things!
