Caught in the middle of the local body polls, which the party could not conduct while in power in 2018, the opposition TDP is suffering heavily with the defections in Andhra Pradesh.
Several senior leaders, key players of the party in respective districts, are deserting the party giving sleepless nights to the party leadership.
Party MLC Dokka Manikya Varaprasad and party Visakha Urban unit president and former MLA S A Rahaman have left the party and joined the ruling YSR Congress.
As if this is not enough, senior leader from Kadapa district and former MLC S Satish Reddy, former MLA from Prakasam district Kadiri Baburao too have deserted the party giving a rude shock.
It may not take much time for another senior leader from Kadapa and former minister P Ramasubba Reddy to leave the party and join the ruling YSR Congress. This would be a major set back to the party in the years of crisis.
Kadiri Baburao’s exit will be a major loss to the TDP in Prakasam district, besides a personal loss to Nandamuri Balakrishna.
Similarly, Satish Reddy’s exit will leave the TDP headless in Kadapa to fight against the YS family. Satish Reddy had been fighting against the YS family in Pulivendula constituency and he is the only face of the party.
Whenever Chandrababu Naidu loses power, he loses the party key leaders too as he ignores them and stops their growth while being in power.
Naidu is said to be the weakest person psychologically and is scared of any strong leader and fears of even relatives.
This keeps him busy discouraging the strong leaders in the party and that is the reason the party has no strong second leader ever since he took over the reins in 1995.
The TDP has no strong leaders like Nallapureddy Srinivasulu Reddy, Upendra, Lal Jan Bash, Devender Goud, Yerran Naidu and Mothkupalli Narasimhulu who held their word when NTR was heading the party.
These second line leaders have slowly lost their charm under the leadership of Chandrababu Naidu and the party has one leader Chadrababu Naidu in the first 100 places.
When he loses power, he loses this importance too and thus loses the leaders too. It is this reason that makes the party watch haplessly the unfortunate exit of the key leaders in the State.