Chief Minister and ruling YSR Congress president, Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy seems to have taken one step down and held talks with the dissident leaders. As some of the leaders who aspired to get the cabinet berth are holding protests the chief minister broke his silence and invited them for a talk with him at his Tadepalli camp office.

On Tuesday, former minister K Partha Saradhi, MLAs Pinnelli Ramakrishna Reddy and Samineni Udaya Bhanu met the chief minister separately. He is understood to have explained his difficulty in composing the cabinet giving due representation to BCs, SCs and other castes.

The three MLAs are silent, but their supporters have been holding protests for the past 24 hours. The supporters of Udaya Bhanu and Ramakrishna Reddy have even blocked the roads and asked their leaders to come out of the party. However, Partha Saradhi and his supporters did not make any protest but Saradhi had communicated his feelings to the chief minister.

Former minister and Rajya Sabha member Mopidevi Venkata Ramana took the initiative and held consultations with these three leaders. He later took them all to the chief minister at Tadepalli. Venkata Ramana also held talks with former home minister Mekathoti Sucharitha who had threatened to quit the party in protest. However, she did not come to Tadepalli to meet the chief minister.

On Monday, the chief minister met former minister Balineni Srinivasa Reddy from Prakasam district, who was dropped from the cabinet. Srinivasa Reddy had a brief chat with the chief minister where he reportedly expressed his displeasure over retaining 11 ministers from the previous cabinet ignoring him.

However, coming out from the meeting with the chief minister, the former minister said that he would work with the new cabinet. Balineni Srinivasa Reddy is having some issues with Minister Adimulapu Suresh who was retained in the new cabinet. The chief minister is understood to have settled the issues between the two leaders and had asked them to work for the party.

Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy is likely to make frequent visits to the districts for the next two years. He remained indoors for three years, mostly because of the Covid 19 pandemic and launched all his schemes from his camp office at Tadepalli.

The opposition accused him of staying in the ‘Tadepalli Palace’ and not coming out to meet people and see what is happening outside. With the Covid 19 easing out slowly, Jagan Mohan Reddy seems to have decided to come out of his ‘Tadepalli Palace’ and address public meetings in every district.

Sources say that he has more than a dozen cash benefit schemes for the people, at least one in every month. He used to transfer the cash to the beneficiaries’ bank accounts sitting in the camp office. But now he had made up his mind to go to the districts and make the cash transfer. He would then address a public meeting. This would give him an opportunity to hit back at the opposition and explain the welfare schemes of his government.

TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu and his son Nara Lokesh have been addressing the media conferences every day making at least one allegation against Jagan Mohan Reddy. The media too is coming up with one story or the other against the chief minister and the state government every day.

Jagan Mohan Reddy had hardly responded to this criticism in the last three years. He never addressed a press conference except on the day of the 2019 results and when the then State Election Commissioner Nimmagadda Ramesh Kumar postponed the local body elections without consulting the government in March 2020.

He is holding review meetings with the officials, where a video clip of his brief speech is released to the media. Similar video clips of his speeches whenever he transferred the benefit to the people under one scheme or the other are also circulated to the media.

He addressed the Independence Day celebrations and the Police Commemoration Day event where he spoke a little about his schemes and responded to the opposition criticism. Other than these, he hardly spoke in the last three years.

But, the next two years, Jagan Mohan Reddy is understood to have decided to go to the people and attack the opposition besides explaining his schemes. In a way, he is in election mode and would use every opportunity to make an election-like speech.

Interestingly, before the 2019 elections too, he took a break from the Assembly and was on the road for two years walking all the way from Idupulapaya to Itchapuram, which brought him to power. Now, he started his public meetings with one at Narasaraopet on Thursday and the other at Nandyala on Friday. This series would continue for the next two years, if information coming out from Tadepalli is to be believed.

AP Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy intensified his attack on the opposition parties and a section of the media. While he called them demons at his meeting at Narasaraopet the other day, he made even stronger and derogatory remarks against the opposition at Nandyala on Friday.

Jagan Mohan Reddy said that the opposition parties and a section of the media were leading a false campaign against him, he said that they were also unable to digest the welfare schemes that the government was implementing. He said that they have eyesore and digestion problems towards the welfare programmes.

The chief minister went one step ahead and said that the opposition “can’t pluck my hair” as people responded with whistles and slogan shouting. He said that the TDP, Jana Sena and a section of the vernacular media have joined hands to defeat him and asserted that they can’t do anything to him as long as he enjoyed the support of the people.

He has been silent on the opposition criticism for the past three years in office. Except once or twice, he never reacted to the criticism by the TDP and negative news reports in the media. However, he started responding to them now and even going harder against them.

Going by the two public meetings that he had addressed in Narasaraopet and Nandyala, it is clear that Jagan Mohan Reddy would go even harder against the TDP, Jana Sena and the vernacular media. He had already declared them as his rivals for the 2024 elections and he would refer to them in every public meeting that he would be addressing henceforth.

It is to be seen how the opposition and the vernacular media reacts to this criticism or rather counter attack by Jagan Mohan Reddy. Some news channels and a couple of daily newspapers have been carrying reports against him every day and every week. While the TV channels have debates in the morning and evenings, the print media has reports on their daily editions and weekly editions.

For the first time, Jagan Mohan Reddy is reacting to them in his public meetings and the situation is likely to be the same or even worse for the next two years.

Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy is the third chief minister in Andhra Pradesh to get all the ministers to give their resignations at one go. He got all his 24 ministers to submit their resignations on Thursday as expected. He is scheduled to have his new cabinet on April 11.

Earlier, in the undivided Andhra Pradesh, it was then chief minister Tanguturi Anjaiah, who had asked his ministers to submit their resignations. He had faced criticism of having a jumbo cabinet with 58 ministers in the cabinet, besides the chief minister. He took the resignations of all the ministers and reconstituted his cabinet after two days with a considerably low number, which was around 45.

Later, N T Rama Rao constituted his second cabinet between 1985-89 with 63 ministers. However, N T Rama Rao was the second chief minister who got all his cabinet ministers resigned. He took the decision following the leakage of the budget highlights.

NTR was active in the national politics in those days and the party legislators did not protest as he did so. They have seen his anger and the popularity among the people particularly after his first finance minister Nadendla Bhaskara Rao raised a banner of revolt in August 1984.

Jagan Mohan Reddy, thus is the third chief minister to get the resignations of all his cabinet ministers. This would give him free hand to constitute a new cabinet, in which some old faces are also expected to be accommodated.

While the first two incidents happened without prior notice, the third development was anticipated and overdue. Jagan Mohan Reddy had said that he would drop all the ministers and have a new cabinet with fresh faces after the first half of his term. Accordingly, he got his ministers to resign on Thursday.

Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy took the resignations of all his 24 ministers at the cabinet meeting held at Velagapudi on Thursday. He will be forming the new cabinet on April 11. Sources say that the chief minister had decided to retain at least five ministers from the present cabinet.

Jagan Mohan Reddy had said that he would revamp the cabinet in two-and-a-half years, when he formed his first cabinet in June 2019. He was originally scheduled to revamp the cabinet in December last year, but changed it due to Covid 19.

Those who have been in the cabinet till date, will be used for the party for the next elections. They would work in coordination with the legislators and local leaders from now till the elections. All the outgoing ministers would be given one district each to work at the grassroots level and get majority MLAs elected in the next election.

Jagan Mohan Reddy had reportedly told the ministers that he was in pain to send them out of the cabinet, but asserted that he was doing it as per the word he had given three years ago. He also told the ministers that he wanted to give a chance to some new people to work for the government.

Meanwhile, the chief minister is likely to send the resignations to Governor Biswabhushan Harichandan for his approval. He had already communicated the changes in the cabinet to the Governor when they met in Raj Bhavan on Wednesday. He had already requested the government to administer the oath to the new ministers on April 11.

The chief minister had already completed the exercise and finalised the names of the new cabinet ministers. The new cabinet, as usual, is likely to reflect the social and gender composition, as he had done in the first cabinet. The new cabinet would also have five deputy chief ministers each representing women, Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Minorities and Kapus.

This time, the Brahmin community is likely to get a berth in the cabinet as it was not given representation in the first cabinet. The Arya Vysya community is likely to be given the Assembly deputy speaker post, which is now held by a Brahmin.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy on Wednesday met Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari and urged him to extend support to the Visakhapatnam-Bhogapuram beach corridor project for providing better connectivity and boosting tourism.

He told Gadkari that the officials are preparing better plans for the project as directed by him during his recent visit to the state.

On the second day of his two-day Delhi visit, Jagan Mohan Reddy held discussions with Gadkari regarding key road projects of the state.

The Chief Minister said the construction works of western bypass in Vijayawada are on brisk pace and urged the Union Minister to take measures to link this road to CRDA grid Road.

According to the Chief Minister’s Office, he told Gadkari that the state government has identified the lands and is ready to give it for Multi Model Logistic Park related to the Vijayawada western bypass. He urged the Union Minister to help to prepare DPR and move forward in this regard.

The Chief Minister said 20 ROBs have been sanctioned for the state and urged Gadkari to sanction another 17. He also requested him to take steps for the construction of 1,723 km of national highways connecting various tourist destinations, industrial nodes and special economic zones in the state and appealed for the construction of these roads connecting the centres of the newly formed districts.

The Chief Minister said the state Tourism Department has sent proposals for construction of 14 ropeways across the state of which two were approved and requested the Union Minister to approve the remaining proposals.

Jagan Mohan Reddy also called Union Home Minister Amit Shah and discussed various state-related issues.

The Chief Minister had called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday.

The state government has decided to create one more revenue district in the state. The cabinet meeting which is scheduled to be held on April 7 will give its clearance for the new district. The new district would come up with Rampachodavaram as its headquarters. This would be the third district in the state exclusively for the Scheduled Tribes, after the Manyam and Alluri Sitharama Raju districts.

The new district would be carved out from the Alluri Sitharama Raju district and East Godavari district, to make the total number of districts to 27. The astrologers have reportedly alerted chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy about the inauspicious number 26.

The state government had created 13 new districts in addition to the existing 13 new districts. With this the total number of districts went up to 26.

Though Jagan Mohan Reddy had promised to create new districts with Parliamentary constituency as basis, he created 26 districts against 25 Parliamentary constituencies in the State. Manyam district with Parvathipuram as headquarters is an additional district.

Now, going beyond this number, the chief minister is understood to have decided to create one more district with Rampachodavaram as its headquarters. This new district would have Rampachodavaram and Polavaram Assembly constituencies in it.

However, there is also information that the Chief Minister wants to name it as Polavaram district, as he is dedicating the Polavaram Project to the nation in 2023 in memory of his late father and former chief minister Dr Y S Rajasekhar Reddy. Jagan Mohan Reddy also plans to install his father’s statue at the Polavaram project site and name the new district after the project.

Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy took everyone by surprise when he announced that he had accepted the request of Opposition leader, N Chandrababu Naidu in the reorganization of districts. He addressed the MLAs and the new collectors after inaugurating the new districts from his camp office at Tadepalli on Monday.

Jagan Mohan Reddy said that the government had received several requests for inclusion and deletion of areas in the new districts and upgradation of some areas as revenue divisions. He said that the government had carefully examined all the requests and considered them if they were reasonable and genuine.

He said the Kuppam too was made the headquarters of the new revenue division, following a request from its local MLA, N Chandrababu Naidu. He said that the TDP chief, while being the chief minister of the state for 14 long years and also the opposition leader for 10 years, had done nothing for Kuppam.

“Chandrababu Naidu could not make Kuppam a municipality. He could not make it even a revenue division. We have made it a municipality and now a revenue division,” Jagan Mohan Reddy said, as the legislators responded with claps.

However, Jagan Mohan Reddy did not accept the demand of Chandrababu Naidu’s brother-in-law and TDP MLA from Hindupur, Nandamuri Balakrishna to make Hindupur the new district headquarters.

At the same time, Jagan Mohan Reddy had created a new district with Vijayawada as headquarters and named it after the late N T Rama Rao. This was also the request of the relatives of NTR from his native village, Nimmakuru, which falls in Machilipatnam district. As NTR studied in Vijayawada and worked while staying here, naming of the new district after the later leader had won him applause.

Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy is scheduled to visit New Delhi tomorrow. He is to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi at 4 pm. The Prime Minister’s office had already communicated the appointment to the chief minister’s office at Tadepalli.

The chief minister would be meeting the Prime Minister ahead of the Presidential election and also the election to the four Rajya Sabha seats from Andhra Pradesh. The YSR Congress is likely to extend support to the Presidential candidate of the BJP-led NDA government.

The YSR Congress had extended support to the BJP-sponsord candidate Ram Nath Kovind in 2017 elections. This time too the YSR Congress is likely to back the BJP-sponsored candidate. This time too, the BJP leadership is likely to ask the YSR Congress to support its presidential candidate.

Though the victory of BJP in Uttar Pradesh, Goa and Manipur had kept its edge over the opposition parties in the Lok Sabha, it still requires the support of the parties like the YSR Congress, to have the ride comfortable.

The issue is likely to come up for discussion during the meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and chief minister Jagan Mohan Reddy. However, it is not known what conditions that Jagan Mohan Reddy would place before the BJP leadership and the Prime Minister when he offers his party’s support.

Sources say that Jagan Mohan Reddy is likely to press for the Special Category Status and the Ramayapatnam Port issues as precondition to his party’s support to the BJP in the presidential election. Special Category Status is the core issue that would come in the way of the YSR Congress in the 2024 elections.

Jagan Mohan Reddy is working hard to find a way out from the Special Category Status demand. He wants the Central government to consider the demand or show an acceptable alternative that would comfort the voters in Andhra Pradesh to vote for him in the next elections. It is to be seen what Jagan Mohan Reddy would bring for the state when he meets the Prime Minister.

Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy had posted his cabinet meeting for April 7. This would be the last cabinet meeting for more than 90 per cent of the ministers, if only the chief minister decides to retain a couple of ministers.

The cabinet revamp is a herculean task for Jagan Mohan Reddy as he had to compile the ministry with all equations like caste and gender. It was not an easy task for him to have all these considerations after three years, as the discontentment pics up.

There are hopefuls more than the cabinet size and most of them feel that they are the most deserved ones. If they can’t make it this time, it would fuel the discontentment, which might end up in defections by the turn of the 2024 elections.

It is said that a good number of legislators are looking at other parties, considering that they might not get the party ticket in the next election. Some of them are unhappy with the style of Jagan Mohan Reddy, who, according to them, is acting ‘undemocratic’.

While all political parties in the world’s largest democracy are mostly dictatorial, to be a dictator is a must for the regional parties to survive. Jagan Mohan Reddy and his YSR Congress are no exception to this phenomenon.

Meanwhile, Jagan Mohan Reddy is likely to take the resignations of the ministers at this April 7 cabinet meeting. This is to make his job easy as he could submit the resignations to the Governor and get the way cleared for swearing-in of the new ministers.

Sources said that the chief minister’s office had already sent communication to all the ministers to come to the cabinet meeting with resignations duly signed. However, the CMO had not sent the communication to those whose names Jagan Mohan Reddy had cleared. Sources say that the chief minister’s office would send a formal communication only on April 10 evening as the swearing-in is likely to be held on April 11.

Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy completed the shuffling of the senior IAS and IPS officers in the state ahead of launching of the new districts. The government released the transfer orders of the bureaucrats late on Saturday.

The government posted collectors, joint collectors and SPs for all the new districts. The joint collectors who have been working in various districts holding the charges of revenue and village secretariats have been posted to the new districts.

The government also completed the creation of district level police units, while retaining the police units in the two police commissionerates of Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam. The other police units of Rajamahendravaram, Tirupati and Guntur urban police units have been converted into district units with the formation of districts within these towns.

The State would now have just two police commissionerates, while a fresh commissionerate of Amaravati is yet to see the light. Chief Minister Jagan Mohan Reddy had planned to create a police commissionerate and municipal corporation with Amaravtai, giving the urban administrative look for the 29 villages.

However, the process did not move further as the people of the Amaravati villages have refused to attend the public hearing for conversion of the rural areas into urban agglomeration. Once this process is completed, the state would have three police commissionerates.

Meanwhile, the chief minister had also transferred some of the senior IAS officers in the government on Sunday morning.