The beleaguered Telugu Desam Party in Visakhapatnam, which received a big jolt last week with the defection of Visakha Dairy chairman Adari Anand, his sister Rama Kumari and thousands of party workers into the YSR Congress party, got yet another rude shock on Wednesday.
Senior TDP leader Chintakayala Sanyasi Patrudu, who is the younger brother of former minister Ch Ayyanna Patrudu, resigned from the party along with scores of his followers.
They submitted their resignation letters to the party through fax. The defection was a shock to Ayyanna, who is celebrating his birthday on Wednesday.
Sanyasi Patrudu and his followers, however, did not immediately disclose which party they would be joining in and said they would make an announcement to that effect shortly. But indications are that they would be joining the YSR Congress party.
All these days, Sanyasi Patrudu had been the right hand of Ayyanna Patrudu in Narsipatnam and played a major role in establishing the TDP network in the constituency.
There had been differences between the two brothers of late and the party has virtually split into two groups in the last few days.
However, Ayyanna did not expect that his brother would resign from the TDP. In a way, the resignation exposed the sorry state of affairs in the party in Visakhapatnam district, say sources.