‘Three capitals is not an important issue for Vizagites, but development is’
Visakhapatnam city, which is called the ‘City of Destiny’, is destined to grow, and making it the capital does not appeal to the people or will have an impact, says M. Sribharat adding that Vizag is a ‘city of settlers’ and that people will always look fo
n the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, M. Sribharat of the TDP lost the elections by a whisker to YSRCP’s M.V.V. Satyanarayana. His margin of dierence of vote share was less than 1%. Now, he is back again in 2024, this time pitched against YSRCP’s Botcha Jhansi Lakshmi. In an exclusive interview with The Hindu, Sribharat, who heads the GITAM deemed to be university, was candid in saying that the people of Visakhapatnam are not really concerned whether this city becomes the Executive capital or not, as per chief minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy’s ambitious threecapital plan.
The electorate in this Lok Sabha segment is
Imore concerned about good roads, quality drinking water, good trac management, more yovers and wider roads and other infrastructural benets.
“This city, which is called the ‘City of Destiny’, is destined to grow, and making this as the capital city really does not appeal to the people or will have an impact,” he said.
Visakhapatnam is a ‘city of settlers’, and the people will always look for opportunities for themselves and their children. That makes this constituency a unique one in the State.
But on whether the underprivileged also feel that same, he said, “The views are the same. I agree that the underprivileged section might have beneted to some extent from the welfare schemes of the State government, but they are not looking at it now. They also talk about longterm benets such as industries and investments, which will provide employment opportunities and good amenities. This is where the current State government has failed, and we already have a road map designed by Mr. Naidu to address these issues.”
About the bonhomie among the cadres of the alliance parties at the grassroots, he was forthright in accepting that initially there were some hiccups, but now things are smoothening up.
“The disgruntled elements have been pacied by the party higher-ups, and things are falling into place. Today, our joint campaign has been a success, and we are now focussing on vote share transfer. This is the key factor for the winning equation, and we are ironing it out. We now have a good working relationship among all the three alliance parties,” said Mr. Sribharat.
Talking about his prospects in 2024, he sounded condent he would win by a big margin. In 2019, I lost by just 4,000 votes. I would have won by over 50,000 votes, but we had two spoilers who did not win but took away a solid 1.5 lakh TDP votes from our kitty.
“But this time, out of the seven Assembly segments, we are comfortably placed in at least ve seats. One would be a close nish, and in one seat, the going is a bit tough,” he said.
Mr. Sribharat also pointed out the prevailing law and order situation in the State. “There is no action on serious crimes, and that is why criminals are getting emboldened,” he said.
On the challenges and the road ahead, he said, “The challenge is to be more organised and use better strategy. The most important part is how to manage the people’s expectations. The opposition party is desperate for a win, and we need to counter that strategically on the polling day.”