Jagan may go in for rejig of Cabinet ahead of polls

VIJAYAWADA: Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy is likely to go in for a partial reshuffle of the state Cabinet for the third time. The speculation is rife as sources said that the Chief Minister would be giving a chance to newly-elected MLCs to strengthen the YSRC for his ‘Mission 2024 — Target 175’ initiative.

Jagan Mohan Reddy had reshuffled the Cabinet for the second time after the completion of three years of his government by taking 14 new ministers and according to the sources, he is planning to rejig the present Cabinet to include MLCs since none was inducted earlier. They also said this time he also plans to take in some “firebrand legislators”. This has given some minister who have been termed as “poor performers” the jitters.

There is only a year left for the elections and Jagan Mohan Reddy has already put his party into the mission mode. The party’s Gadapa Gadapaku Mana Prabhutvam is one of the mass contact programmes. The ruling party continued its winning streak in all elections including municipalities, corporations, zilla parishads, MPPs, MPTCs, ZPTCs and village sarpanches by grabbing a majority of the seats.

The elections for two teachers and three graduates constituencies were held in which the YSRC for the first time won MLC seats from the teachers constituences but the triumphant feeling evaporated due to the debacle in graduates constituencies. For the first time the ruling party lost all three MLC seats from the graduates constituencies with the opposition Telugu Desam registering a clean sweep.

Sources said that the recent anti-incumbency seems to have caused a bit of worry as the performance of a few ministers were not up to the expectations of the Chief Minister. In the Cabinet meeting held on March 14, the Chief Minister had also warned ministers about losing their berths.

Home minister Taneti Vanita said that during the meeting the Chief Minister had indicated a minister or two ministries would be replaced for poor performances and instructed all ministers to be aggressive.

Besides, sources said that the Chief Minister had offered MLC posts to several leaders who joined the YSRC from the opposition to make good use of their services in the elections and also to attract various social groups. They further said that now they are in a position to get berths under the social engineering concept initiated by the Chief Minister.

Sources said that apart from MLCs, Kodali Nani, Perni Nani and Balineni Srinivas Reddy also fancy their chances in reshuffle. The Chief Minister had surprisingly called animal husbandry minister Dr Seediri Appalaraju on Friday making the latter rush from Vizianagaram to meet the Chief Minister. Appalaraju later affirmed that he is not bothered about losing the minister’s post. These surprise calls from the Chief Minister are keeping ministers on the edge.