Andhra Pradesh had been a bastion for the Congress party ever since its formation in 1956. It had been at the helm of the combined State for about 35 years since then, and 15 Chief Ministers ruled it during the period.
The grand old party had enjoyed a monopoly of sorts in almost all these years till actor-turned-politician N.T. Rama Rao floated the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) in 1983. From then on, the going had been tough for the Congress party.
With the Election Commission of India declaring May 13 as the polling day for the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in Andhra Pradesh, the State is all set to witness what is being referred to as the ‘mother of all elections’.
These elections will witness a direct fight between the ruling YSR Congress Party led by incumbent Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy and the TDP-BJP-JSP alliance led by veteran TDP leader and three-time Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu.
The three-party combine had taken on Young Turk Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy who had entered the poll fray for the first time in 2014 after launching his outfit. Though the alliance had won the election and Mr. Naidu became the Chief Minister, Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy made a mark by winning about 70 of the 175 Assembly seats.
The grand old party bit the dust and did not win even a single seat as people blamed it for the bifurcation blues the State had to endure.
In the ensuing elections, the TDP-BJP-JSP alliance will be taking on Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy, who had stormed to power 2019. He is now riding high on his welfare schemes.
For Mr. Naidu and JSP chief Pawan Kalyan, it is a do-or-die battle. The election results will decide the very existence of the parties in the political arena. For the BJP, it is a matter of prestige, as it is a part of the alliance.
The elections in the State have never been so polarised by caste. Though the upper hand has always been of the upper castes, especially the Reddys and Kammas, the backward castes and Kapus, which have sizable electorate share, are the deciding factor, and every political party is now trying to woo them.
In the combined State, at least 10 Chief Ministers from the Reddy community have been at the helm for about 35 years, followed by those from the Kammas, who had ruled for about 18 years. Both these communities comprise around 4-6% of the total population in the State. While the BCs comprise around 50% of the population, the Kapus comprise around 15%.
The polarisation is so deep that even a leader like Mr. Pawan Kalyan, who rides high on his matinee idol image, has chosen to contest from the Kapu dominated Pithapuram constituency as he too hails from the community.
Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy, who announced the candidates for all the 175 Assembly seats on Saturday, allocated 59 seats to the BCs, up from 48 in 2019, and seven to minorities, up from five in the previous elections.
All political parties are busy in social engineering and have selected candidates from the dominant castes in the respective Assembly segments.
What makes the election interesting is that the Congress party, which went into hibernation after the bifurcation of the State, is hoping to bounce back, and the appointment of Y.S. Sharmila, sister of Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy, as PCC chief is a shot in the arm for it. Ms. Sharmila is leaving no stone unturned to improve the party’s image and has been very vocal in exposing the YSRCP government’s failures and Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy’s policies.
