Senior TDP leader and former Union minister K Yerran Naidu, considered the right-hand man of Chandrababu Naidu, died in a road accident in the small hours of Friday.
Yerran Naidu was returning to Srikakulam after attending a marriage in Visakhapatnam along with four party associates including the TDP’s Srikakulam district president Choudhari Narayana Murty alias Babji in a Mahindra Xylo belonging to the latter.
At around 2 am, as the vehicle was entering Ranasthalam, the driver failed to notice a tanker that was taking a U-turn.
At great speed, the Xylo rammed into the rear tyre of the tanker on the right side.
The five passengers in the car were asleep at that time. Yerran Naidu, sitting in the front seat of the car, was crushed between the windshield and the dashboard.
The injured were rushed to the KIMS Sai Seshadri Hospital in Srikakulam. Yerran Naidu had received very grave head injuries and doctors could not revive him. He was declared dead at about 3.30 am.
The body was shifted to Yerran Naidu’s camp office in Srikakulam town and from there to his village Nimmada in Kotabommali mandal.
The other injured men, including Babji, K Appala Naidu, M Suresh and the driver Sridhar, are undergoing treatment at KIMS in Srikakulam.
As news of the accident broke in the morning, a pall of gloom came over the TDP headquarters NTR Bhavan in Hyderabad. Many party leaders broke down upon learning of the death of their senior colleague, a Politburo member of the party.
A shocked Chandrababu Naidu put his padayatra in Mahabubnagar district on hold and left for Nimmada to pay his respects to his party colleague. “I’ve lost my right hand,” he said.
PM Manmohan Singh, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, governor E S L Narasimhan, chief minister Kiran Kumar Reddy, deputy chief minister C Damodara Rajanarasimha, PCC chief Botcha Satyanarayana, Tamil Nadu governor K Rosaiah and TRS chief K Chandrasekhar Rao were among those who expressed grief.
Yerran Naidu is survived by his wife, a daughter and a son. The son is studying in the US while his married daughter lives in Rajahmundry.
