Telangana Election Results: Chandrababu Naidu's own niece trailing in her constituency
Telugu Desam Party's founder's granddaughter loses to Telangana Rashtra Samithi's candidate
She hails from one of the most prominent families of Telugu politics.
Her grandfather — Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao — is the man who started the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) driven by “Telugu Pride”.
Her father — Nandamuri Harikrishna — was a cine idol-turned-politician who drove his father’s political Chaitanya Ratham almost non-stop for eight months, eventually led the coup that overthrew his father and TDP founder-president, and made N Chandrababu Naidu — his sister’s husband — president of the TDP, himself being considered Naidu’s right-hand man.
She is thus Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Nara Chandrababu Naidu’s niece.
She is Nandamuri Venkata Suhasini — now the defeated TDP candidate from Kukatpally.
The 43-year-old law graduate is a first-time politician and was given the TDP ticket to contest as part of the Mahakutami alliance from Kukatpally. It has been a wide accusation against Chandrababu Naidu that he wants to make Suhasini a scapegoat and gave her the losing ticket of Kukatpally. In fact, K Taraka Rama Rao went to extent of alleging that if Chandrababu Naidu really cared for the Nandamuri family, he should have appointed Suhasini as a minister in Andhra Pradesh, like he appointed his son, Nara Lokesh.
“Would he (Naidu) have made Lokesh contest from Kukatpally? He did not, because he knows that Kukatpally is a losing seat. Naidu wants to make Suhasini a scapegoat and later wants to restrict her brothers (Jr NTR and Nandamuri Kalyan Ram) from entering into politics,” KTR reportedly alleged.
Whether it was a campaigning strategy or an astute observation, KTR’s words stand true today as Suhasini is trailing by a margin of over 27,000 votes in her constituency with her rival, Madhavaram Krishna Rao of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi leading with over 48,000 votes. Interestingly, M Krishna Rao was a former TDP MLA who had defected to the ruling TRS after being elected on the TDP ticket in the 2014 polls.
Besides N Chandrababu Naidu, several top TDP leaders and film stars (including her younger brother Jr NTR — the superstar of Telugu cinema today) had campaigned for Suhasini. Clearly, star-power did not raise her electoral quotient.
For Chandrababu Naidu, this defeat comes as a double-whammy as he was keen to win this seat and “teach a fitting lesson to Krishna Rao for his betrayal”.
Ironically, the constituency comprises of a large population of migrants from Rayalaseema and Coastal Andhra regions of Andhra Pradesh — a loyal base of Chandrababu Naidu.