Anantapur: In an interesting twist, the former vice-chancellor of the JNTU and the Sri Krishnadevaraya University and the Jana Sena leader, Dr K. Rajagopal, sacrificed his seat of the Anantapur Urban Assembly segment after the party high command offered him a top position in the party.
Although Mr Rajagopal’s name was in the list of candidates, the list has been changed and the new list was released on Tuesday. The Jana Sena allotted the ticket to T.C. Varun, whose father T. Prakash had contested previously as a PRP candidate from the Anantapur segment in the 2009 elections and lost.
The Telugu Desam allotted a ticket to the sitting MLA V. Prabhakar Chowdary despite the party leaders’ various protests wherein they demanded that the party should allot tickets to the Kapus.
In a similar situation, the YSRC announced the candidature of the former MP Ananta Venkatrami Reddy from the urban segment while majority YSRC leaders were pressurising the party’s high command to justify the Kapus in the district.
“The Jana Sena announced T. C. Varun as a candidate to target Kapus votes from Anantapur where the majority of voters belongs to the Kapu section. The former vice-chancellor will be given a high position in the Jana Sena party,” sources told this newspaper.
Dr Rajagopal, a native of Anantapur, has done a Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1976 and a Master’s degree in Heat Power in 1978 from the Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Anantapur.
He earned his Ph.D in Mechanical Engineering at IIT Madras in 1991 and started his career as a lecturer.
He has worked as a vice-chancellor for the Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU), Hyderabad, of the combined states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, and more recently, as the vice-chancellor for S.K. University, Anantapur.
