 On 30 November 2010 he became Agriculture Minister in the Andhra Pradesh cabinet headed by N. Kiran Kumar Reddy.Later, in the 2011, Vivekananda Reddy contested the Pulivendula by-elections caused due to Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy and his mother, Y. S. Vijayamma, leaving the INC to form YSR Congress.He stood as the INC candidate against his sister-in-law and just managed to secure his deposit after finishing in second place but some 80,000 votes behind Y. S. Vijayamma.