New Delhi, April 6: Telugu Desam Party chief N. Chandrababu Naidu is facing a third challenger from within his family to the political legacy of the party’s charismatic founder-leader N.T. Rama Rao.

NTR’s eldest daughter B. Puramdeshwari has made a surprise entry in the poll fray as the Congress nominee from the Bapatla Lok Sabha constituency in the coastal Andhra Pradesh district of Guntur.

Puramdeshwari had recently joined the Congress, but her move was perceived to be inconsequential follow-up to her husband Daggubati Venkateshwar Rao’s move to the party last November.

Puramdeshwari could present several headaches to brother-in-law Naidu, who is fighting a tough battle to retain power in the state. She was known to be her father’s favourite daughter and her presence in the Congress camp could have an impact beyond the confines of Bapatla.

Also joining her in the challenge to Naidu is husband Venkateshwar Rao. He is the Congress candidate for the Parchur Assembly segment of the Bapatla Lok Sabha seat Puramdeshwari is fighting.

Curiously, it is a double family split. If Puramdeshwari’s move has meant a political crack in the NTR family, her husband has also divided his Daggubati family. Puramdeshwari’s Desam rival in the battle for Bapatla is a sitting MP and well-known Bollywood film producer Daggubati Rama Naidu, a cousin of her husband.

The Congress is elated at being able to field NTR’s daughter and son-in-law against the Desam and lay some claim to his political legacy.

So much so, the party made way for Venkateshwar Rao in Parchur by shifting its sitting MLA to another constituency.

While the challenge to wrest NTR’s legacy has come from the Congress this time, the earlier attempts were from within the Desam, which Naidu had weathered.

On the first occasion, the unsuccessful challenger was NTR’s widow Lakshmi Parvati. She had floated a parallel Telugu Desam Party (NTR) to take on Naidu in the 1996 general elections.

However, her party fell by the wayside. Lakshmi Parvati tried to resurrect the challenge in the 1998 polls by joining hands with the BJP, but that too made no difference.

In the 1999 simultaneous Lok Sabha and Assembly polls, NTR’s son Harikrishna raised the banner of revolt with his Anna TDP. However, he could not even sustain the challenge through the electioneering phase.