VIJAYAWADA: Accusing the ministers, YSR Congress MLAs and ruling party party leaders of resorting to 'intimidation and physical attacks' in order to force unanimous panchayat elections in the State, TDP supremo N Chandrababu Naidu has said that the YSRC leaders have a hidden agenda behind their so-called call for ‘unanimous elections’.
He said that the TDP is giving a call for leaving the choice of electing the panchayat sarpanches to the villagers themselves so that efficient leaders will be elected for bringing real development in their villages.
Addressing a press conference at the party Central office at Mangalagiri near here on Thursday, the TDP chief alleged that the ruling party resorted to threats and physical attacks to illegally grab an "alarming number" of seats in the MPTC and ZPTC polls held in March last year.
Naidu showed video clippings of how the ruling party leaders and their henchmen attacked a TDP MLC and a former MLA in Macherla and how the nomination papers were snatched away from rival candidates.
As against 2.67 per cent in 2014, an whooping 23 per cent of (2,248 out of 9,696 MPTCs) MPTCs were elected unanimously in 2020. Only one ZPTC out of 652 seats was unanimous in 2014, which is just 1.15 per cent. Whereas, in 2020, over 125 out of 652 ZPTCs were unanimous, which was a whopping 19 per cent, he pointed out.In Kadapa, the YSRC won 386 MPTCs unanimously, he said.