The death of three persons in a stampede at Telugu Desam Party president and former Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu’s rally at Guntur on Sunday night, the second such incident in a span of four days, has put the TDP in a tight spot.
The TDP chief had already been under criticism from the ruling YSR Congress party and his other detractors for the death of eight persons in a similar incident at Kandukuru town in Nellore district on December 28.
Now, he will have to think twice before holding such meetings at street corners and narrow lanes, since one more such incident would definitely fetch him a lot of political damage and the people might hesitate to turn up for such meetings.
On the other hand, sources said, the police also might not give permission for Naidu to hold the road shows and public rallies in future, even if he wants to hold them in open grounds.
The two incidents have provided enough grounds to the Jagan government to deny permission to such future rallies.
The YSRC leaders have already started questioning why stampedes are occurring only at the TDP chief’s meetings.
“Obviously, the TDP are going overboard to project that Naidu is drawing huge crowds to his meetings by organising them in congested areas. Never in the past were there any incidents of stampede during the Jagan’s meetings, which were much larger than the Naidu’s meetings,” a YSRC leader said.
At least in the near future, Naidu might not get the police permission for the rallies and even if he does, he may not draw bigger crowds.
Now, there is a talk that the police might not give permission even for the padayatra of Naidu’s son Nara Lokesh, scheduled to begin from January 27, as the TDP would have to mobilise huge crowds to his padayatra.
If there is any disturbance during the padayatra of Lokesh, the situation will come back to square one and the police would deny permission on the pretext of law-and-order breakdown.