Kanigiri: Prakasam district, like many parts of Rayalaseema, is a drought-stricken area. Kanigiri constituency is one of 12 constituencies in the district. It was represented by Kadiri Babu Rao from the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) who, with 79,492 votes, that is 50.00% of the total votes, emerged victorious in 2014. The runner-up in the 2014 polls was Burra Madhusudana Rao from the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP), who polled 72,385 or about 45.47% of the total votes.

Previously Kanigiiri, in the 2009 general elections, was represented by Ugra Narasimha Reddy Mukku from the Indian National Congress (INC).

Kanigiri has been reeling from a water crisis in recent years. High flouride levels have impacted community health in the area. If the TDP government had pursued the Veligonda project, the water crisis in the region could have been mitigated, locals say. A Central government team visited the area last December to study the drought conditions in the region, but the situation has not improved much, villagers across the district say.

The sitting TDP MLA Kadiri Babu Rao, is considered to be a close associate of Chandrababu Naidu's brother-in-law and Lokesh's father-in-law, Hindupur MLA Nandamuri Balakrishna. There was a question mark over the renomination of Kadiri Babu Rao, but Chandrababu seemed to have yielded to pressure from his brother-in-law. The feedback on Babu Rao is reported to made the party leadership reluctant to give him the tickets, sources say, but as it turned out, he got the ticket in the end.

However, the Kanigiri MLA has a challenge on his hands with the YSR Congress party making inroads into the Prakasam constituency in a big way. People everywhere thronged the public meetings of Leader of Opposition in AP, YS Jagan Mohan Reddy bearing testimony to the growing popularity of the YSRCP here.

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