Naidu, Lokesh among 99 faces in TDP-JSP’s first list; 57 seats on hold amid BJP suspense

The Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and the Jana Sena Party (JSP) on Saturday jointly declared their first list of candidates for the Assembly elections in Andhra Pradesh, to be held simultaneously with the Lok Sabha polls.

Of the 99 candidates announced so far, five belong to the JSP while the remaining 94 are from the TDP.

However, while the TDP will contest 94 seats out of the state’s total 175 Assembly seats, the JSP will contest 24 seats while the remaining 57 seats have been kept pending. Sources in the TDP said that both the TDP and the JSP are waiting to see if the BJP joins their alliance, which would necessitate seat-sharing in the 57 seats.

The prominent names among the TDP candidates announced includeparty chief N Chandrababu Naidu, who will contest from his home turf of Kuppam, and his son and party general secretary N Lokesh Naidu, who will contest from Mangalagiri. The party’s state unit president, K Atchan Naidu, will contest from Tekkali, while the former Andhra Pradesh BJP chief Kanna Lakshminarayana will be fielded by the party from Sattenapalle.

Some of the other high-profile TDP candidates are Kishore Kumar Reddy, the younger brother of former Congress CM Kiran Kumar Reddy, contesting from Pileru, and Naidu’s brother-in-law and actor Nandamuri Balakrishna contesting from Hindupur.

Among the JSP’s candidates are Nadendla Manohar from Tenali, Lokam Madhavi from Nellimarla, B Balaramakrishna from Rajanagaram, Pantham Nanaji from Kakinada Rural, and Konathala Ramakrishna from Anakapalle.

Amid tense seat-sharing talks and hard bargaining between the two allies, actor-turned-politician and JSP chief Pawan Kalyan on Wednesday said he had pleaded with the BJP’s central leaders to formalise the alliance with the TDP-JSP