Jana Sena chief Pawan Kalyan is said to be looking at Gajuwaka Assembly constituency once again. He contested from here in 2019 along with Bhimavaram. However, he lost this seat by a margin of over 16,000 votes along with Bhimavaram, which slipped off his hands by a margin of over 6,000 votes.
It was thought that he would not come back to Gajuwaka and would contest from Bhimavaram and Tirupathi this time. However, Pawan Kalyan is said to have laid his hands on Gajuwaka and had even asked the TDP leaders to give him this seat.
The TDP leaders are not ready to give up Gajuawaka where they are comparatively strong. The TDP leaders are fighting for this seat hoping that they would wrest the seat from the YSR Congress, which won this seat in the 2019 general election.
Sources say that Pawan Kalyan had laid the condition of giving him the Gajuwaka seat to attend the Yuva Galam concluding public meeting. It was only after Chandrababu Naidu promised to give the seat to him, Pawan Kalyan is said to have attended the meeting.
Gajuwaka is one of the two Assembly seats that Pawan Kalyan wants to fight in the 2024 general election. The second seat is Pithapuram, which is mostly dominated by the Kapu voters. Pawan Kalyan is said to be confident of winning both the seats with the support of the TDP, which is his alliance partner.
However, sources in the TDP say that it would not be easy for Pawan Kalyan to win either from Gajuwaka or from Pithapuram, as both have been the strongholds of the TDP. The TDP leaders in both the segments are not ready to give up the seat to anyone in alliance.
Even if the party is compelled to give the seats to Jana Sena, the TDP sources confirm that they would not transfer their votes to the Jana Sena. It would be a disastrous defeat for both the Jana Sena and the TDP, if either of these two seats is given to Jana Sena, the TDP leaders commented.