Former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Nallari Kiran Kumar Reddy is reportedly looking at Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to rejuvenate his fallen career in Andhra Pradesh politics.
Reddy resigned as CM, protesting own party Congress' decision to bifurcate united AP. But he bit the dust in the elections, which followed the Centre's order to split united AP to create Telangana state.
Even BJP is rigorously trying to fill the political vacuum in Andhra Pradesh that has been caused by the routing of Congress in the last elections. If Reddy, who has considerably clean record, joins BJP, he will definitely help the party to root further in the southern state.
After quitting as CM before the last elections, Reddy launched Jai Samaikhyandhra Party to encash the "Telugu pride" and the people's anger on Congress, for separating Telangana from them.
However, Telugu people completely rejected both Congress and Reddy's party in the elections and reined-in N Chandrababu Naidu in residual AP as Chief Minister and Narendra Modi as the Prime Minister at the Centre. In the last elections held in united AP, the people voted the TDP-BJP combine in the residual AP and TRS in the Telangana region.
Quoting sources close to Reddy, reports say that the former CM of Andhra Pradesh has no inclination to return to Congress as it has been wiped out in Andhra Pradesh, by not winning even a single seat in the last elections.
Ideologically Reddy does not want to join BJP as it is also one of the parties which supported the bifurcation of united AP. But his brothers, close aides and a business conglomerate from Gujarat, which is said to be very close to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, are understood to have convinced Reddy to join BJP.
After the elections, Reddy is said to be spending time in Bangalore, away from public life in his home state. However, he is said to have some links with key BJP leaders in Bangalore, who also prompted him to join the party.
Hence, Reddy's confidants and the corporate house from Gujarat are said to be having discussions with BJP. The Gujarat-based corporate house is the one which had got into a Memorandum of Understanding of trade with the former Congress government in AP, when Reddy was the Chief Minister.
The MoU relates to Rs 5,000 crore industrial park and a port in the Andhra coast. Reddy, as then CM of united AP, tried to allot the Gujarat company the land between Visakhapatnam and Kakinada but it did not materialise. But the business group and Reddy are in touch with each other even now. Being close to Modi, the company wants to work for Reddy and get him into BJP.
