A record of sorts by YSR On the move
He visited each district 33 times since he assumed office in May 2004 till notification of polls on March 2
Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy
HYDERABAD:
Even as the election campaign by key leaders is yet to gather steam, political parties may find it tough to match the pace of Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy.
Leaders of the other political parties including the main Opposition Telugu Desam and Praja Rajyam are still to get into full-fledged election mode owing to issues like candidate selection that remain unresolved so far. Given the acute shortage of time before the polling day, they may not be able to match Dr. Reddy in the number of tours he has undertaken even before they hit the road.
In the strict sense, Dr. Reddy’s were not party tours, but he managed to reach out to voters in the districts to launch and publicise various schemes of his government. On an average, the Chief Minister visited each district 33 times from the time he assumed office in May 2004 till announcement of the poll schedule on March 2.
What a feat!
According to figures compiled by his office, Dr. Reddy toured the districts 726 times! In effect, he spent a full two years of his five-year-long tenure in one district or the other, maybe not for the full day.
His native district, Kadapa, accounts, perhaps understandably, for the maximum number of 52 visits. Ranga Reddy and Mahbubnagar districts, which provided platforms for launch of a host of welfare schemes, came next with 42 visits each.
Visits to faraway Vizianagaram district were lowest at 22 while Dr. Reddy visited 15 districts spread over the three regions at least 30 times each.
Naidu not behind
Telugu Desam president N. Chandrababu Naidu is the only other Chief Minister to have toured the districts so extensively, especially in the latter half of his almost nine-year stint, thanks to his penchant for conducting surprise visits to check implementation of different programmes.
