KURNOOL: The election fever is yet to pick up at Kodumur Assembly constituency. The nominees of the ruling party TDP, B Ramanjaneyulu (Retired IAS officer) and YSRC, Dr Sudhakar Babu, are both new entrants to politics and not local residents too. It is said that nearly 95% of the local population have not seen the candidates yet.

K Narayana, native of Chanugondla village, said that though the nomination process began on March 18, and all are busy campaigning,  candidates of the two main parties in Kodumur, have not taken the campaigning seriously. “I do not know about him and why the people should vote for him,” an MPTC member, belonging to TDP said, expressing his doubt over his party nominee’s victory. He wondered how the people would vote for him without seeing him.

M Venkataswamy, a kirana shop organiser, at Kodumur town, said that political parties should have given the seat to existing or old faces. “Both the candidates of TDP and YSRCP are new entrants into politics and have no political experience. The YSRCP candidate has met people in the town at least once or twice, but the TDP candidate is yet to arrive,” he said.

Kodumur assembly segment has four mandals, which includes Kodumur, Gudur, Belagal and Kurnool. More than two lakh voters are enrolled in the list and nearly 269 polling stations are around the segment.
 “It is very tough to meet all voters during the poll campaign within a short time,” Mallikarjuna, resident of Gudur town, said. He said that both the persons are new to people. “While a majority of the candidates in other segments of the district have already covered about half their constituencies, here the candidates are yet to begin their campaign,” he said.

When TNIE contacted him, former commissioner of PR and TDP candidate B Ramajaneyulu admitted that the people of the constituency are right. He said that he would go on door-to-door campaign to meet people from Thursday. He said that he had taken a house on rent at Kodumur. “I have understood the issues of the people of Kodumur and will work to resolve them if people elect me as MLA,” he added.