I thank Raghuveer Mukkamalla for his service to the nation

Today, Raghuveer Mukkamalla, the Vice President - Finance of PFL, has announced his resignation. It was always a pleasure to work with him. I have been working with him since 2010 when I was the Vice President - Finance of PFL. Later on, in 2012, he stepped in to my shoes in PFL. In addition to this responsibility, he has devoted few thousand hours of his time and also significant monetary contribution for the sake of bringing about better politics in India. He mainly worked for improving the lives of the people in Kukatpally constituency in Hyderabad city, though he lives in the Washington D.C. area in the U.S.

I look forward to working with him again sometime.

You can reach out to him at raghuveerm @ gmail.com to convey your thanks.

Second place in postal ballot results in Malkajgiri Assembly

We at 'Dilip for Malkajgiri' campaign get second place in postal ballot in Malkajgiri Assembly. Results declared yesterday.

Total postal ballot votes received: 520
Total valid votes: 467
1) TRS: 161
2) LSP: 144 -> yours truly
3) BJP/TDP: 73
4) Congress: 43
5) YSRCP: 24
6) AAP: 7

To an extent, this again shows the strong support for us in Malkajgiri Assembly among educated employees. TRS getting the highest votes should be due to the sentiment factor even among educated employees.

Thank you for your support -- Malkajgiri Assembly elections 2014

Volunteers, supporters and well-wishers,

Thank you for your support in various forms since May 2012 for the campaign -- donating, volunteering and spreading the good word.

The results for United Andhra Pradesh State Assembly elections are declared and mainly due to the highly-polarized voting pattern among the electorate due to the highly emotional Telangana issue, I could not secure a victory.

Those who supported the cause of Telangana voted for TRS and those who did not support the cause, voted for TDP/BJP combine. Mine and our party's voice was lost out in these emotional developments.

Till the election day, I was one among the four candidates who were perceived by the public to be in the race for victory. But on the polling day, we observed two trends -- highly polarized polling due to the regional divide and low voting percentage of only 52% (a low voter turnout meant that upper/mid-middle class voters, who usually support us, did not turn up to vote).

I secured 12,121 votes out of 2,31,108 votes polled. The polarization resulted in TRS winning by securing 77,132 votes while the BJP/TDP got 74,364 votes for the second position.

That said, I must share the good news that a large section of people indeed perceived me as "someone who can do a good job that will be better than other contestants". They believed my track-record, "respected" and "liked" me as a person. Even our message during our campaign was in sync to what people perceived about me.

The fact that I delivered the second-best result in United Andhra Pradesh for our party (both in number of votes secured -12121, and vote share percentage secured - 5.24% ) gives credence to this. (best performance is from our State President who contested from Kukatpally constituency that we had won in 2009 -- 13004 votes and 5.6% vote share).

I will continue to spend some of my time in public initiatives and I will work towards implementing part of my public initiatives in Malkajgiri constituency.

I seek your continued support.

My special thanks to our fundraisers for the campaign

I must specifically thank my fundraisers who used their networking and communication skills to raise funds for our campaign. Some of them spent sizable number of hours to contact others and ask for funds. They believed in the campaign and used their personal goodwill and social capital to set the conversations going.

Within Malkajgiri constituency: I want to thank Sivaramudu Ediga garu for contacting many residents and raising funds. I must mention he has been the only fundraiser from within the constituency. He is a role model for all other Lok Satta Malkajgiri members in this aspect.

From outside the constituency: I would like to thank Kalyan Raman, Venkat Didugu, Sravanthi Yalamanchili, Venkat Pendurthi and Raghuram Tadimalla for being the fundraisers.

Apart from this, a large number of donors asked some of their friends to donate for the campaign.

I am thankful to all of you.

Pen gifted to me at the Harvard University, Boston, in 2013

I was just sifting through memorabilia at home and came across the pen gifted to me when I went to the Harvard to speak about my work for the people. The shield of the Harvard can be seen too.

At a 'Headlines Today' discussion program hosted by Rahul Kanwal about 10 days ago

Expansion of the scope of donations to our activities

I have been seeking donations for three main activities that I was supervising in two categories.

Category 1: Political initiatives
Activity (a): My political campaign

Category 2: Social initiatives
Activity (a): Social activities such as road-side drinking water kiosks during summer, school bags to girl child, food distribution in orphanages and old-age homes, lighting facilities to tribals and nomads, etc.
Activity (b): 'Voter India' initiative involving door-to-door voter enrollment, voter deletion check-up centers, etc.

In coming months, I would like to expand the scope of the donations to include a third category -- "Environmental initiatives."

Why?

1. Environment is very important to all of us, wherever we live
2. I am interested in spending some time in activities related to environment and I have a track record
3. I would like to include those who resonate with "environmental initiatives" in our "family of donors"

Watch out for more! Yes, please feel free to donate at www.dilipsankarreddy.com/donate

My accomplishments over the last 2 years

Irrespective of the nature of the result in the election, I would like to mention what I consider my accomplishments over the last 2 years:

• Doing my bit by standing as an example to demonstrate that politics is for everyone. To make a statement that it is for teachers, consultants, scientists, architects, engineers. It is for people of every single occupation.
• Clearing lots of doubts in hundreds of people about the nature of our engagement with politics. I have answered thousands of questions, engaged with many people over almost every day and I must say, inspire many to spend, at least few hours in our political processes.
• Provided perspectives and actively involved/led activities related to governance, voter registration, civic responsibility.
• Persuaded few hundred people to realize the importance of donating to a political campaign and actually donating.
• Communicated over Facebook, articles, conference appearances, television, emails, about various ideas, happenings, processes of our political and civic engagement.

I might have made many mistakes, I might have been wrong many times, I could have done a lot of things better than how I did them. I learned along the way. I learned by being with you all people.

Only 52% voter turnout in Malkajgiri Assembly constituency

I am sad for the last two days because the voter turnout in Malkajgiri Assembly constituency, the political campaign in which managed to grab the attention of the entire state, could achieve a voter turnout of only 52%.

The turnout has actually reduced from 54.6% in 2009.

This is the same story across most of the constituencies across Hyderabad.

We led the Voter India initiaitive in Malkajgiri to enroll thousands of new voters and inspire people to turn up to vote. Yet, we have a low voter turnout.

I am blaming the people for this. They, as a group, do not have any excuse for failing to vote. The sad state of governance in India is due to non-participation of people in the electoral process.

I am an optimist. So do join me in the Voter India initiative at www.dilipsankarreddy.com/donate

Most of the donations to me are from people I have not yet met

Let me tell you an interesting fact -- Most of the donations to me are from people I have not yet met!

Another fact -- Most of the donations to me in recent times are from people I do not know personally or professionally!

I will put out more detailed statistics soon.

May be this pleasant phenomenon is because people far and wide like what I do with their money and trust me for putting their money for the intended task.

It has been two years since I started asking funds for my activities in public sphere. A good number of people have responded and I have immense gratitude to my "family of donors". In coming years, I am thinking of certain initiatives to take this forward and engaging with my "family of donors" in a more constructive and fulfilling manner.

Yes, you too are welcome to join this family: www.dilipsankarreddy.com/donate

I look forward to your support. Thanks.

Kudos to Sirivennela Seetarama Sastry for taking a public stance

What ails our celebrities -- moviestars, entrepreneurs, sportspersons, writers, etc., -- is they do not come out in public to endorse good candidates. Most of the time, they want to be in the good books of everyone and not take any political stance.

Sirivennela Seetarama Sastry came out and took a public stance to endorse Lok Satta and me. He spent considerable amount of time for the last few weeks in this effort. I thank him for that.