BJP comfortably wins 24 seats to 50-seat Visakhapatnam corporation

At first glance the election of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Communist Party of India (CPI) nominees as mayors of Visakhapatnam and Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh does not seem of major importance. But the Opposition victory in the first elections to the newly constituted municipal corporations is the most significant reversal suffered by the Congress(I) since the 1978 Legislative Assembly election.In the August 27 elections the BJP comfortably won 24 seats to the 50-seat Visakhapatnam corporation. As one of the six independents elected also supported the BJP, the party was able to ensure that N.S.N. Reddy, the party's state treasurer and a local MLA, was nominated as the port city's first mayor.The Congress(I) on the other hand, won only eight seats, even though the Minister of State for Municipal Administration S. Alwar Das, represents a Visakhapatnam constituency in the Legislative Assembly.Reasons: N.S.N. Reddy also represents a Visakhapatnam constituency but he has nursed it more assiduously than Das. After his victory he said: "Now 21 of the 24 BJP councillors represent the municipal wards in my assembly constituency which has 28 wards. What has made this possible is personal contact and knowledge of the constituency." BJP workers took around pictures of Reddy, who is the principal of a local tutorial college, while they were campaigning. His personal contacts also enabled his wife Lakshmi, 47, and son Vivekanand, 26 - both party activists - to be elected as councillors.N.S.N. Reddy and Venkateswara Rao: Convincing winFor the Congress(I) the trouncing came as a severe shock. Much of the blame for the defeat fell upon Alwar Das who managed the party campaign. His choice of candidates has been assailed. It is said that he chose his personal assistant as the candidate for one seat ignoring the claims of the Visakhapatnam City Congress(I) Committee president.It was much the same story in Vijayawada, the trading town on the Krishna river. And this was despite the fact that several Congress(I) leaders including many ministers took part in the tensely fought campaign in the town. Here the four party combine formed by the CPI, the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), Janata and Lok Dal won a remarkable 28 of the 34 seats it contested in the 44-seat assembly. There was never any doubt that its nominee T. Venkateswara Rao of the CPI would be the mayor. The Congress(I) on the other hand, won only seven of the 42 seats it contested. But the party had no inkling that it would suffer such a defeat. Even before the elections they had begun the game of dividing the spoils and three aspirants were jockeying for the job of mayor.Special Significance: The elections assume a special significance because they are the only elections which have been held on a party basis after the April by-elections for the three Legislative Assembly seats. In April in the Legislative Assembly elections, also, the Opposition had done creditably, wresting the Chirala seat and winning a larger share of the vote in all the other constituencies.When the results of the election became known, Chief Minister T. Anjiah trotted out the usual excuses to explain the defeat. He accused the Opposition of resorting to goondaism and rowdyism and of obstructing his party workers during the campaign. His party workers went even further and offered even more elaborate and unconvincing excuses.Said Andhra Pradesh Congress(I) Committee (APCC-I) Secretary M.R. Sham Rao: "Officials deliberately held up kerosene supplies to Visakhapatnam and this went against us." APCC(I) President M.A. Aziz, who offered to resign from his job as forests minister to devote himself wholly to party work, said: "Our party is so strong that nobody can defeat it unless there is infighting." The CPI State Council Secretary N. Giri Prasad countered, saying: " They are resorting to self-deceit and subterfuge."Part of the reason for the defeat is obviously that the party is in disarray and plagued by infighting. But there is no sign that this is likely to diminish in the near future as a result of the defeat.Published By: AtMigration Published On: Oct 31, 2013 15:58 IST--- ENDS ---

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BJP comfortably wins 24 seats to 50-seat Visakhapatnam corporation

At first glance the election of the Bharatiya Janata Party and Communist Party of India nominees as mayors of Visakhapatnam and Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh does not seem of major importance.

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