VISAKHAPATNAM: Kinjarapu Ram Mohan Naidu, 31, who became MP from Srikakulam in the 16th Lok Sabha, appears set to be re-elected in the forthcoming parliamentary elections , observers in Srikakulam said on Wednesday.Naidu, the son of the late Kinjarapu Yerran Naidu, a Telugu Desam Party (TDP) stalwart who died in a road accident in 2012, has been renominated by the TDP to defend his seat in the election due to be held on April 11.Observers cite several reasons for their conviction that Naidu will get re-elected, the primary being an opposition, which is in disarray. The YSR Congress ( YSRC ) has nominated Duvvada Srinivas, 47, as its LS candidate in Srikakulam. Srinivas had contest the state assembly election in 2014 and lost to Kinjarapu Atchannaidu, an uncle of Naidu, from the Tekkali constituency.“Ram Mohan Naidu has the support of the numerically large Kalinga caste in all the seven assembly segments, which constitute the Srikakulam seat. The Kalingas used to support Naidu’s father, Yerran, and they transferred this support to Ram Mohan Naidu,” says Hasan Zaman, 78, a long-term resident of Srikakulam whose father served as the Srikakulam municipal chairman in the seventies.Dr Mahendra Varma, a dentist in Srikakulam said, “Ram Mohan Naidu is accessible to his constituents. He lived in Srikakulam when parliament was not in session and held regular meetings with his constituents at his residence in town. The first time, in 2014, I think, he was voted in as the LS member with a majority of nearly 1, 28,000 votes, because of the loyalty that Yerran Naidu commanded among the voters. In the past five years, Ram Mohan Naidu has built his own constituency of supporters, among all constituents,” says Dr. Varma.But many others beg to differ. A few say that Srikakulam will see an intense battle between Naidu and Duvvada Srinivas.According to Dharmana Prasada Rao , who is the YSRC candidate for the Srikakulam assembly segment, Duvvada Srinivas will be a ‘surprise package’ in the election. “There is a strong current of anti-incumbency against Chandrababu Naidu in Srikakulam district , and it is the YSRC, which is being seen as the alternative,” Rao said on telephone on Wednesday.Rao also discounted the claim that Ram Mohan Naidu has the complete backing of the Kalinga community. “Naidu is a Velama while Duvvada Srinivas is a Kalinga. There are about 1,50,000 Kalinga votes in Srikakulam constituency. Obviously, these votes will be split between Naidu and Srinivas, unlike in 2014,” he said. Like Prasada Rao, Ram Mohan Naidu also belongs to the Velama community, whose number is about a lakh in the constituency.“Ram Mohan Naidu has done nothing to help Srikakulam enhance its economic profile in the five years he was MP. The people of Srikakulam want change and they will get it on April 11,” he added.

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