Lok Satta Party

MADASU BHANU PRASAD

Madasu Bhanu Prasad is the Guntur District Vice President and Chilakaluripet Constituency Incharge of Lok Satta Party.

Bhanu Prasad has the right combination of idealism, vision and pragmatism essential in a leader. Born in 1975 in Chilakaluripet, he has a strong record of service and achievement for the past 15 years. His engagement with local issues, and regular articles in newspapers highlighting them, caught the eye of other political parties when he was quite young. However, he knew that he could not be part of their way of functioning and continued to work independently. With the launching of Lok Satta movement in 1997, he found the right platform and was one of the early activists, contributing significantly to expand the movement and playing his part in its groundbreaking achievements. When Lok Satta transitioned into a in 2006, Bhanu Prasad became Town President for Chilakaluripet.

His steady focus has been on improving the standard of civic life in Chilakaluripet. To this end, he has led campaigns that solved problems of traffic accidents, water logging and drainage, and rogue animals. He is using and promoting the use of RTI to fight corruption and administrative negligence. Other activities in adjoining rural areas include working with women groups for closing down belt-shops and supporting the farmers’ agitation against land grabbing for highway construction. As Chilakaluripet Constituency Incharge of Lok Satta Party, he leads a team of about 15 party workers and together, they have achieved tangible success in spite of severe financial and familial constraints.

Contesting in the 2009 Assembly elections from Chilakaluripeta constituency, Bhanu Prasad received 1053 votes. This is quite a significant number in the prevailing circumstances, where, unlike almost all other contestants, he was not offering any freebies or making dishonest and impractical promises, but had a pragmatic and progressive agenda. Apart from his own commitment to public service, Bhanu Prasad believes that he has a duty to repay the respect and faith of the 1053 citizens who voted for him. That he did not win the election and post only limits the extent of his influence, not his vision and effort. This is the hallmark of a genuine public servant and marks him out as a man who can do justice to power and responsibility.

For promoting the party, Bhanu Prasad emphasizes the importance of achieving tangible results locally, Lok Satta Party since people need concrete evidence that Lok Satta not only talks about problems and solutions, but actually gets things done. For promoting the party, Bhanu Prasad emphasizes the importance of achieving tangible results locally, since people need concrete evidence that Lok Satta not only talks about problems and solutions, but actually gets things done. Once such a belief is strongly established, the goodwill for the party will crossover to influence voting decisions. He appeals to supporters to look beyond expecting pub- lic support and votes based purely on party ideology or charisma of top leadership, and to put in the hard work without becoming discouraged by electoral performance.

Further, he believes that strengthening the party in Chilakaluripeta, and similar towns elsewhere, should be based on finding ways to engage the youth and harnessing their energy. He feels that such youth currently have a dearth of role models, and the overarching and fanatical popularity of film heroes is a symptom of this. He has successfully persuaded some youngsters to see how their devotion to matinee idols is making them blind to real life heroes - those people, past and present, who made great sacrifices to fight for the freedoms they take for granted. Gratifyingly, some of them are now actively working on converting their friends.

Growing up, Bhanu Prasad had the ideal role model. The seed for public service was sown early in him by the influence of his father, the late Sri Madasu Akkaiah. Humanitarian, stage actor, man of integrity - Akkaiah garu inspired by example. He chose to forgo personal and professional gains to uphold principle and was prepared to face the consequences of resisting the powerful. He also taught his son to have an unwavering confidence in oneself and one’s values, without being swayed by temporary fashions.

Bhanu Prasad’s vision for Chilakaluripeta is to make it a safe and healthy place for citizens, by focusing on issues such as prevention of avoidable traffic hazards and provision of amenities from safe drinking water to bus shelters, and public spaces like parks. He believes that, all over the state and country, directing efforts and funds to solve such local problems is the primary means to win the support of people and establish Lok Satta as a political force. He appeals to all citizens, including NRIs, to both encourage and join those people from their own locality that are working for change.

He can be contacted on phone (9441753329) or via email ( [email protected] ).

Text: Sundeep Pattem ( [email protected] ) Design:Santoshi Pattem