Nara Bhuvaneswari, the wife of Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief and former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, announced the 'Kalalaku Rekkalu' poll promise on March 8, International Women’s Day. Under this scheme, the TDP and Jana Sena alliance, if vote to power, will act as loan guarantor for women obtaining loans from banks to pursue professional courses, and the government will also bear the entire loan interest for the duration of the course, she said.
Speaking at a public meeting in Pattikonda while campaigning for the upcoming Assembly elections, Bhuvaneswari said the scheme is aimed at helping women achieve their goal of pursuing professional courses. With this initiative, no daughter of Andhra Pradesh will have to compromise on her dreams due to financial constraints, she said. She also said that the scheme would be a significant step towards women's empowerment in Andhra Pradesh, allowing all eligible women to pursue professional courses of their choice anywhere in the country.
TDP chief Naidu and Jana Sena president Pawan Kalyan met Union Home Minister Amit Shah and BJP President JP Nadda in Delhi on March 7, reportedly to discuss an alliance between the three parties before the upcoming elections to the Andhra Pradesh Assembly and the Lok Sabha. The talks reportedly focused on the number of seats to be allotted to the BJP as part of the tripartite alliance.
The TDP and Jana Sena have already announced their seat-sharing agreement. The TDP has left 24 out of 175 Assembly and three out of 25 Lok Sabha seats for Jana Sena. The same day, the TDP announced its first list of 94 candidates while Jana Sena released the list of five candidates. Chandrababu Naidu and Pawan Kalyan had stated that if the BJP comes forward to join the alliance, they will hold talks and take an appropriate decision.
The Jana Sena, which is part of the BJP-led NDA, joined hands with the TDP even before a decision by the saffron party. Pawan Kalyan had long been trying to convince the BJP leadership to join the alliance to ensure that anti-YSRCP votes do not split.
The TDP, which had snapped ties with the BJP in 2018, evinced interest in reviving the alliance after suffering a crushing defeat in the 2019 elections. However, the BJP had been cold to Naidu’s overtures as the YS Jagan Mohan Reddy government in the state had maintained friendly ties with the Union government and extended support to it in the Parliament in passing several key bills.
With IANS inputs