TDP likely to offer 25 Assembly, 3 Lok Sabha seats to Jana Sena; no word on BJP yet

VIJAYAWADA: Jana Sena president Pawan Kalyan met TDP president Chandrababu Naidu at his residence in Undavalli on Sunday to discuss seat sharing talks for the upcoming Lok Sabha and Assembly polls in Andhra Pradesh.

The meeting went on for over an hour when Pawan Kalyan reportedly asked for 55 Assembly seats and five Lok Sabha seats. The Jana Sena Party wanted to contest in at least one Assembly seat in 25 Lok Sabha segments and five each in the erstwhile Srikakulam, a Vizianagaram, Visakhapatnam, East and West Godavari districts.

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The TDP is apparently considering allocating 25 Assembly seats and three Lok Sabha seats to Pawan Kalyan. Last month, Naidu and Pawan Kalyan announced their candidates unilaterally for two Assembly seats for the Andhra Pradesh polls this year. Pawan announced that his party would contest Rajanagaram and Razole constituencies after Naidu finalised that the TDP would contest Araku and Mandapeta constituencies, which created fissure between the two parties.

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This was the final meeting before the TDP and the JSP announce their MLA and MP candidates. The announcement on seat-sharing along with a joint manifesto by the two parties is likely to be made after February 10. Pawan Kalyan and Naidu would start to actively start campaigning for the alliance in Andhra Pradesh this week.

Surprisingly, during the talks, there were no word on the JSP-BJP alliance who are officially partners in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA). It’s not clear whether the BJP and the JSP would continue their alliance or whether the BJP would also join this alliance.