By Mohammed Shafeeq, IANS,
Hyderabad : It is all in the family for the Congress in Andhra Pradesh. Eight combinations of brothers, four couples and one pair each of father-son and father-daughter are in the fray for next month’s elections to the state assembly and parliament.
As many as 29 candidates of the Congress have either their children, spouses or brothers contesting the elections.
Leading the list is Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy and his industrialist son Y. S. Jaganmohan Reddy. While YSR is seeking re-election from Pulivendula assembly constituency, his son is contesting for the first time from Kadapa Lok Sabha seat.
Tribal Welfare Minister D.S. Redya Naik is again contesting for the assembly while her daughter M. Kavita will make her debut by contesting for another assembly seat.
There are at least four couples fighting to get into the state assembly or the Lok Sabha.
Central minister D. Purandareswari, daughter of Telugu Desam Party founder N.T. Rama Rao, is the Congress candidate from the Visakhapatnam Lok Sabha seat. Her husband D. Venkateshwara Rao is seeking re-election to the assembly.
The couple joined the Congress just before the 2004 elections.
Another central minister, Pannabaka Lakshmi, is contesting from the Bapatla Lok Sabha constituency. This time she also got the assembly ticket for her husband P. Krishnaiah, who was chief public relations officer in South Central Railway.
K. Suryaprakash Reddy, son of former chief minister K. Vijaybhaskar Reddy, and his wife Sujatamma will seek re-election from the Kunrool Lok Sabha and Dhone assembly seats respectively.
State Minister for Marketing Botsa Satyanarayana has not only managed retain his assembly seat and his wife’s Lok Sabha seat (Vizianagaram) but also got an assembly ticket for his brother Appala Narsaiah.
There are at least seven other combinations of brothers who will be contesting elections.
Minister for Labour G. Vinod will contest again to the assembly while his industrialist brother G. Vivekananda is making his debut from the Peddapalli Lok Sabha constituency. They are sons of veteran Congress leader and former union minister G. Venkatswamy.
K. Venkat Reddy is contesting again for the assembly while his brother K. Rajagopal Reddy is contesting for the first time for the Lok Sabha from the newly created Bhongir constituency.
M. Rajamohan Reddy is the Lok Sabha candidate from Nellore while his brother M. Chandrasekhara Reddy is contesting for the state legislature.
Revenue Minister Dharmana Prasad Rao will seek re-election to the assembly while his brother D. Krishna Das will contest from another constituency.
Minister for Information and Public Relations Anam Ramnarayan Reddy and his brother Anam Vivekananda Reddy are seeking re-election to the assembly.
Minister for IT R. Damodar Reddy and his brother R. Ram Reddy Venkat Reddy are seeking re-election to the assembly.
Congress leader Mallu Ravi and his brother M. Bhatti Vikramarka are also in the fray for assembly elections.
The list would have been longer if the party’s central leadership had accepted the requests of several other leaders to accommodate their family members.