Andhra Pradesh polls: BJP’s Sujana Chowdary gets ticket from Vijayawada

Former Union minister YS Chowdary, popularly known as Sujana Chowdary, will contest the upcoming assembly elections in Andhra Pradesh from Vijayawada (West) constituency on Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ticket.

The BJP on Wednesday announced candidates for all the 10 assembly seats in Andhra Pradesh, allotted to it as part of alliance with the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and JanaSena Party.

Chowdary, who was a two-time Rajya Sabha member from TDP, served as the Union minister of state for science and technology in the first NDA government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

He resigned from the cabinet in March 2018, when the TDP pulled out of the NDA. After the TDP lost the assembly elections in Andhra Pradesh in 2019, he defected to the BJP. He completed his Rajya Sabha tenure in April 2022.

BJP also named its national general secretary Y Satya Kumar for Dharmavaram assembly seat in Sri Satya Sai district.

Among others who were named in the list of candidates for the assembly elections include former state ministers Kamineni Srinivas Rao (Kaikaluru) and C Adinarayana Reddy (Jammalamadugu), former MLA P Vishnu Kumar Raju (Visakhapatnam-East), educationist N Eshwar Rao (Etcherla), Pangi Raja Rao (Araku Valley-ST), M Shiva Krishnam Raju (Anaparthy), Bojja Roshanna (Badvel-SC) and Dr PV Parthasarthy (Adoni).

The BJP has already announced candidates for six Lok Sabha seats allotted to it as part of the alliance. While BJP state president and former Union minister Daggubati Purandeshwari was chosen for Rajahmundry Lok Sabha seat, former MP Kothapalli Geetha was given the ticket for Araku (ST) seat and former chief minister of combined Andhra Pradesh N Kiran Kumar Reddy for Rajampet LS seat.

While outgoing Rajya Sabha member CM Ramesh, who defected from the TDP to BJP was given the ticket for Anakapalle Lok Sabha seat, BJP state secretary Bhupatiraju Srinivasa Varma was given the ticket for Narasapuram constituency.

Former MP and sitting Gudur MLA V Varaprasada Rao, who defected from YSR Congress party to the BJP was given the ticket from Tirupati (SC) Lok Sabha seat.