Andhra Pradesh: Poll pot boiling in 'rice bowl' of India

Telugu Desam Party chief N Chandrababu Naidu met Union Home Minister Amit Shah and the Bharatiya Janata Party chief J P Nadda in New Delhi on February 8. Just a day later, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and the supremo of the Y S R Congress Party, Y S Jaganmohan Reddy, flew to the national capital and met Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The importance of New Delhi and the national parties in the politics of Andhra Pradesh had diminished since 2014. The Congress had scored nil in both the state Assembly and Lok Sabha elections in Andhra Pradesh in 2014 and 2019. The party had paid the price for the role it had played in bifurcating the state and carving out the new state of Telangana. The BJP, which had allied with the TDP, had in 2014 won four of the 15 state Assembly seats and two of the state’s 15 Lok Sabha seats it had contested for. But after the TDP had snapped its alliance with the BJP in 2018, the saffron party had also failed to win in any Lok Sabha or Assembly constituency in Andhra Pradesh in 2019.

The political landscape of Andhra Pradesh witnessed a dramatic shift in the last decade, with the BJP and the Congress being relegated to the sidelines.

But, with the state again going to polls for the Assembly and the Lok Sabha elections in April-May this year, the back-to-back meetings of the two arch-rivals from the state with the BJP heavyweights in New Delhi last week sparked off buzz within the political circles. The meetings took place amid speculation over the saffron party’s hunt for allies in the southern states, ostensibly to raise its national tally in the parliamentary elections. The Congress, which is relying more on the southern states, too is hoping for a revival in Andhra Pradesh.

The undivided state of Andhra Pradesh had been a stronghold for the Congress, which had in 2004 not only dislodged the TDP from power by winning in 185 of the 294 state assembly constituencies but also won 29 of the 42 Lok Sabha seats from the state. It had secured 38.56 per cent and 48.4 per cent votes in the Assembly and the parliamentary polls in the state. It had retained power in 2009 too, winning 156 seats and 36.56 per cent votes in the Assembly polls, in addition to securing 33 LS seats from the state. But after the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government at the Centre carved out the new state of Telangana, the party suffered a severe backlash in Andhra Pradesh. It could not win any of the 175 Assembly or 25 Lok Sabha seats in what remained of Andhra Pradesh after bifurcation. Its vote percentage dropped to less than 3 per cent in 2014 and less than 2 per cent in 2019.

The BJP, buoyed by the nationwide Narendra Modi wave, initially saw promise in Andhra Pradesh. It was a junior partner of the TDP-led government between 2014 to 2018. But the BJP’s emphasis on Hindutva did not work in the state. The lack of strong local leadership and the failure of the BJP-led government at the Centre to grant the Special Category Status to Andhra Pradesh and provide funds for the Polavaram Project stymied its growth in the state. The party’s vote share dropped from 2.20 per cent in 2014 to 0.84 per cent in the state Assembly elections in 2019, when it could not win any seat.

The YSRCP, led by the charismatic Y S Jaganmohan Reddy, entered the fray in 2011 and effectively filled the void created due to the downslide of the Congress after 2014 – promising welfare schemes and riding on the public anger over bifurcation of the state. The regional party had a landslide victory in 2019, winning 151 of the 175 seats and securing 49.95 per cent votes. The TDP could win only 23 seats with 39.17 per cent votes. The Jana Sena Party, led by actor Pawan Kalyan, emerged as a significant player with 5.53 per cent votes and one seat, although its lone MLA later defected to the ruling YSRCP.

Keen to reclaim the lost ground in Andhra Pradesh, the Congress recently roped in Jaganmohan’s sister, Y S Sharmila, to take on the CM and the YSRCP leader. The BJP on the other hand is looking for an ally to gain a foothold in the state. The BJP has an alliance with JSP, which has an electoral pact with the TDP too.

The regional party in Andhra Pradesh aspires to align with the ruling party at the Centre, particularly after the bifurcation that left the state with limited resources. The successive governments in the last 10 years had to rely heavily on borrowing to keep the state running. The opposition argues that the state’s liabilities had touched around Rs 10 lakh crore. The YSRCP government accepted that the total borrowing of the Andhra Pradesh government and the public sector undertakings, both guaranteed and not guaranteed by the state government, stood at a staggering Rs 6,38,217.85 crore, going up from Rs 1,13,797 crore.

The allegations of corruption against the dominant regional players Jaganmohan and Chandrababu Naidu, have also stopped them from going against the BJP.