Kiran Kondeti, head of KK Survey, who shot into prominence after his survey correctly predicted the outcome of the 2024 Andhra Pradesh Assembly elections, seems to be following in the footsteps of noted political strategist and Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC) founder Prashant Kishor.
On Friday, KK announced his entry into electoral politics with a new platform named Aekam. He said Aekam would field candidates in the forthcoming panchayat, municipal and municipal corporation elections across Andhra Pradesh, with an ambitious target of putting up as many as 1.6 lakh candidates.
His announcement is reminiscent of a similar initiative launched by Prashant Kishor after his success as a political strategist. He first launched the Jan Suraaj Abhiyan to advocate reforms in Bihar’s panchayat raj system and later converted it into a political party.
Though Prashant Kishor initially failed to emerge as a major force in the Bihar Assembly elections, he later gained attention after his party won a by-election to the Assembly, ending decades of BJP dominance in the Bankipur Assembly constituency.
Apparently following the Prashant Kishor formula, Kiran Kondeti said he had undertaken an extensive study of the problems confronting people across the state and travelled through villages and mandals to collect public feedback.
“Governments change and chief ministers change, but the problems faced by ordinary people remain,” he said, highlighting issues such as poor drainage systems, pothole-ridden roads, unemployment, inadequate public services and deficiencies in healthcare and education.
KK claimed that people were continuing to incur substantial medical expenses because of diseases such as dengue and malaria. He also referred to the large number of reported street-dog bite cases in the state, saying that more than 2.34 lakh people had been bitten by stray dogs in just six months.
He also claimed that nearly 16,000 schools in Andhra Pradesh had only one teacher, describing the situation as a serious concern.
According to KK’s assessment, more than 70 per cent of people in the state were not primarily seeking freebie-based welfare schemes. Instead, he said, people wanted quality education, better healthcare, a corruption-free administrative system and access to safe drinking water.
He also criticised the manner in which political parties select candidates for local-body elections. He alleged that parties often give tickets to candidates capable of spending large amounts of money during elections, but that such candidates frequently fail to address public problems after winning.
KK said local-body elections should not be viewed merely as contests between the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP).
“These are not elections belonging to political parties; they are elections belonging to the people,” he said.
He also highlighted specific civic concerns, including air pollution in Visakhapatnam, a shortage of municipal staff in the Guntur Municipal Corporation and unemployment among the youth.
Against this backdrop, KK unveiled Aekam as a platform intended to bring together people who want to improve their villages and wards, irrespective of their political affiliations.
He said the platform would provide an umbrella for individuals who wanted to contest local elections honestly and work specifically on civic and local issues.
KK announced that Aekam planned to field 1.6 lakh candidates in the forthcoming panchayat, municipal and corporation elections across Andhra Pradesh.
He said he would personally support candidates who were willing to fight for people’s problems and claimed that Aekam would seek to initiate a new form of political participation at the grassroots level.
