AP Cong to rope in youth leaders to counter Jagan affect

Hyderabad, Aug 9: Seeking to prevent young voters from moving towards Kadapa MP Y S Jaganmohan Reddy and other parties, Andhra Pradesh Congress has started efforts to promote youth leaders at various levels.

"The idea in promoting young leadership is we want to attract youth towards Congress and strengthen the party. We want to groom 500 to 1,000 youth in the age group of 25 to 30 every district. The party intends to use their services for strengthening the organisation," state Congress president Botsa Satyanarayana told reporters here today.

He has held a meeting with children of several prominent party leaders in the state and interacted with them on utilising their services for strengthening the party.

State Home Minister P Sabita Indra Reddy's son P Karthik Reddy and sons of other MPs and MLAs attended the meeting. Satyanarayana, however, said there are no heirs in politics and leadership comes on the basis of merit.

"There are legal heirs but no heirs in politics. Leadership comes only if there is merit and people accept you," he said.

He was asked whether the move was an attempt to prevent children of senior leaders from joining the YSR Congress Party of Jagan.

Referring to the crop holiday announced by farmers in 13 mandals of coastal districts, which are one of the major paddy production centres in the country, Satyanarayana said the government would take steps for paddy procurement and also conduct a workshop on providing new varieties of seeds.

He said he would urge Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy to supply seeds at subsidised rates to farmers in distress.

On the comments of Jagan that the Congress government needs to uprooted, Satyanarayana said the government is working with sincerity and it would not like to respond to various remarks.

PTI