Vijayashanti

Hyderabad, Jan. 23: The BJP proposes to field the party’s mahila morcha vice-president, Vijayashanti, for the Andhra Pradesh Assembly elections, to woo the people of Telengana.

The actress, who was recently on the verge of leaving the BJP and joining the Telengana Rashtra Samiti, is expected to contest either from Indurthi in Nizamabad district or Buggaram in Karimnagar district, according to party sources.

Several hoardings portraying Vijayashanti, a protegee of Union commerce minister Vidyasagar Rao, have come up in the city.

Vijayashanti had joined the BJP in 1999 and campaigned for Rao in Karimnagar.

However, she had drifted away from the party when the BJP central leadership did not nominate her to the Rajya Sabha, and opted for actress Hema Malini. The Telugu Desam Party also poured water on her hopes by renominating their members.

Other silver screen stars who are set to enter the electoral arena include Balakrishna. The actor, whose series of flops over the last two years was broken by a good rating for Lakshminarasimha, said at a film function yesterday that the time was ripe for him to enter politics.

Another actor waiting in the wings is Tarakarama, the grandson of late chief minister .T. Rama Rao, who last month installed life-size bronze statues of his grandparents at their village, Nimmakuru, in Krishna district. However, Tarakarama’s father, former Andhra health minister Harikrishna, is not confident about his political prospects.

The state Congress is also assembling its array of film personalities for the elections.

Leading the pack is film director Dasari Narayan Rao. D. Venkateswar Rao, the health minister in earlier Desam regimes and .T. Rama Rao’s son-in-law, is also likely to join the Congress soon.

Venkateswar Rao, who has strained relations with Andhra chief minister . Chandrababu Naidu, has twice represented Bapatla in Parliament, as well as Martur, in Prakasham district, in the Assembly.

The campaigning in the state is expected to be colourful with about 50 film personalities canvassing for various candidates and Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra also likely to campaign in the state. However, Chiranjeevi — the doyen of the Telugu film industry — has made it clear that he would not want to make a political debut and rub Naidu the wrong way.