VIJAYAWADA: The Praja Rajyam Party (PRP) in the city appears to be enacting the role of a hare in the familiar tale of “The Hare and the Tortoise”. Three months ago, hectic activity was witnessed in PRP circles, but it is visibly missing at a crucial time when the elections are just about a month away.
While the initial enthusiasm is slowly waning in the PRP, activity is steadily picking up in the ruling Congress, the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and other parties. Active leaders in the PRP are panicky over this turn of events.
Some promising leaders in the PRP are attributing this sudden downslide to the “constant interference” of relatives of Allu Aravind and others in the party affairs here. One such leader says nobody is being allowed to take the initiative to take the party programmes to people, with city convener Boppana Bhava Kumar just watching the situation helplessly.
Another opinion is that Mr. Aravind and other top rung leaders are depending solely on their relatives here for any feedback and this has come as a discouragement for many enthusiastic leaders.
As the fear of relatives has gripped everybody, no leader is venturing to take the state of affairs to the notice of party president Chiranjeevi.
A strong feeling among the cadre is that the situation in the party has slipped from bad to worse since the exit of Kesineni Srinivas (Nani).
Sources in the party say that the relatives of Mr. Aravind are directly or indirectly involved in “browbeating and snubbing” other leaders, whenever they try to take up any activity on behalf of the party. Nobody in the top leadership is listening to the voices of all leaders to set right the situation. If this continues for a few more days, it is like losing the battle before it has even begun in this politically active district, the sources say.
The second-rung leaders are unhappy to a large extent over the manner in which the party affairs are being run in the city. At the same time, they are keeping silent so as not to incur the wrath of relatives.
