The Andhra Pradesh government has made another critical decision. AP Govt has decided to modify the name of Konaseema district as B R Ambedkar Konaseema district. In this regard, a preliminary notification is expected either today or tomorrow.
It is known that AP government had previously issued a fresh official gazette notification for the formation of thirteen additional districts in the state under Section 3 of the AP Districts Formation Act (5). These have been created from the state’ existing 13 districts, bringing total number of districts to 26. One of the districts was named Konaseema district with seven Assembly constituencies.
Over the past few weeks, Dalits, communities and various parties have demanded that the Konaseema district, which is centered on Amalapuram, should be named after Dr BR Ambedkar. And finally the government has decided to change the name.
There had been several demands for renaming Konaseema after either former Lok Sabha Speaker GMC Balayogi or B R Ambedkar. Finally, Jagan Mohan Reddy chose to rename Konaseema after Ambedkar, instead of Balayogi, who had represented the TDP- Telugu Desam Party.
Andhra Pradesh might go for an early election, and this move might work well for the YSRCP in the next polls.
Looking at the statistics of the newly made Ambedkar district, it has good number of Dalit and other minority voters. So renaming the district after Ambedkar would fetch mileage to the YSRCP.