Andhra Pradesh TDP leader Yalamanchili Ravi to stay in TDP

VIJAYAWADA: Former MLA and TDP leader Yalamanchili Ravi, who was expected to join YSRC party when YS Jaganmohan Reddy’s Praja Sankalpa Yatra enters Krishna district, seems to have decided to stay put in TDP, for now.

In the wake of the reports that Ravi would be joining YSRC, the TDP chief reportedly directed the party leaders to convince him not to leave the party.  On Sunday, Vijayawada MP Kesineni Srinivas held discussions with him and took him to the Chief Minister’s residence.

It is learnt that the Chief Minister, who was not ready to lose the influential leader in Vijayawada to his rival, promised him a good position in the coming days. “He will not be leaving the party,” Kesineni Srinivas told the media coming out of the CM’s residence.

Ravi said it was true that he had decided to leave TDP due to certain circumstances in the past. Asked about what he had decided now, his said  “You heard what the MP has said”  The veteran leader has a good following in Vijayawada city, particularly in Vijayawada-East constituency, which he represented in 2009 as PRP MLA. In 2014, he did not contest the elections. He joined TDP after State bifurcation.

However, speculation is rife that Ravi might go ahead with his earlier decision to quit TDP and join YSRC.