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TDP not in a hurry for tie-up with BJP

Shireen in Hyderabad

Telugu Desam Party chief and Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu is not in a hurry to finalise a poll alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party for the ensuing snap polls to the Lok Sabha. He is resisting pressure from the BJP national and state leadership to firm up the deal straightaway.

"The BJP leaders are keen because they want to forge an alliance with a dominant party in every state before they evolve their poll strategy. For us in the Telugu Desam, however, the alliance will make only a marginal difference. It cannot bring any dramatic results. But the BJP wants to increase its tally of seats through a tie-up with the TDP," a senior TDP leader explained.

Sources in both the parties --TDP and BJP -- indicated that the BJP leadership wants a positive response on the alliance issue from Chandrababu Naidu in a couple of days but the TDP chief is seeking to delay a decision till the election commission comes out with the poll schedule. "Firstly, the dates will be important. The TDP has favoured June or July for the Lok Sabha polls. The party also wants the assembly polls to be held on schedule some time in November/December. If the Election Commission decides to have the Lok Sabha polls in September or October, it may also club the assembly polls and hold them simultaneously. We must know this before we can take a plunge for an alliance," a TDP source said.

There is divided opinion in the TDP on the poll alliance with the BJP. TDP leaders from Telangana and Rayalaseema region are opposing the tie-up with the saffron party on the ground that it would alienate the minority voters -- both Muslims and Christians -- from the ruling party. The Muslims constitute a big chunk of voters in all the 15 Lok Sabha constituencies in Telangana and eight in Rayalaseema. Besides, the Muslims and Christians together account for a sizeable proportion of the electorate in south coastal Andhra ---which comprises eight Lok Sabha seats. In all, the minorities have a crucial role to play in the polls in 31 constituencies out of 42 in the state.

Several ministers from Telangana and Rayalaseema, including Home Minister A Madhava Reddy, Revenue Minister T Devender Goud, Excise Minister Mandava Venkateswara Rao and Minor Irrigation Minister B Veera Reddy, besides a large number of MLAs, are understood to have voiced their opposition to any understanding with the saffron party. However, some leaders from coastal Andhra, including Agriculture Minister K Vidyadhar Rao, Panchayat Raj Minister Dr Kodela Sivaprasada Rao, the Telugu Desam Parliamentary Party leader (in 12th Lok Sabha) K Yerran Naidu, apart from some legislators, are reportedly in favour of a poll pact with the BJP since they feel that there is a "sympathy wave" for that party now.

Former minister Basheeruddin Babu Khan, who quit the Naidu cabinet following the TDP's support to the BJP-led coalition government in March last year, is also making efforts to bring pressure on Naidu to keep away from the BJP in the ensuing polls. The TDP general secretary S M Lal Jan Basha is also reportedly against the tie-up with the BJP. Other Muslim MLAs and leaders in the TDP are not happy over the prospects of a tie-up with the BJP.

But the BJP leadership is hopeful of an electoral alliance with the TDP. State BJP president Ch Vidyasagar Rao, Union Minister of State for Urban Affairs and Employment Bandaru Dattatreya, BJP national general secretary and spokesman M Venkaiah Naidu and Rajya Sabha member and Dalit Morcha leader Bangaru Laxman have made statements in recent days, openly seeking a poll alliance with the TDP. They have also enumerated the mutual advantages that would accrue for both the parties if they have a tie-up. According to the BJP sources, the TDP requires their support as much as they need the TDP's support because otherwise each of the parties will be "alone and friendless."

In the last elections, the TDP, which contested 35 Lok Sabha seats, polled about 38 per cent of the votes while the BJP's tally was 18 per cent of the popular votes though it fielded candidates in 38 constituencies. This gives a dominant 56 per cent vote-share for both the parties together. "If this happens, we can really sweep all the 42 seats, leaving nothing for the Congress," said a BJP leader.

However, the Congress and left leaders pooh-pooh such claims. According to CPI State Secretary S Sudhakar Reddy, there is no such thing as "a sympathy wave" for the BJP coalition. CPI-M State Secretary B V Raghavulu also rules out any such sympathy for the BJP. Both the CPI and CPI-M leaders say that the BJP's "original, ideological vote bank" consists of only five to six per cent and the saffron party's vote-share will drop to this level in 1999 polls from the peak reached in 1998.

The TDP, too, they add, has lost the support of minorities and other sections such as scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and backward classes, due to its acts of omission and commission in the last one year. Its share, too, will drop by four to five percent, more so because of the Anna-TDP formed by Naidu's brother-in-law N Harikrishna to settle scores with him.

The Communist leaders reckon the share of the TDP and BJP together to be around 40 percent if they have a poll alliance. Without a poll alliance, the TDP tally will go down from 12 seats in 1998 to two to five in the 1999 polls. The BJP will be unable to win a single seat this time, unlike in 1998 when it secured the bonanza of four seats in the state. But if the two parties forge a poll pact, they may together secure half-a-dozen seats, they claim.

The Congress spokesman Gali Muddukrishnama Naidu says even if the TDP and BJP enter into a poll alliance, it will prove counterproductive for both. He explains that in the 1998 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP's popular vote increased four-fold to 18 per cent because of several factors. About 12 per cent of the voters were alienated from the TDP and hence they voted for the BJP. But the post-poll understanding between the two parties alienated these anti-TDP voters who backed the BJP last time. They may now seek another alternative like the Congress.

It is in this backdrop that Naidu wants to keep the BJP leadership on the tenterhooks on the issue of poll pact. The TDP chief has refused to go to Delhi on April 29 despite an invitation from Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee for talks on the issue. Naidu has also been lukewarm to the Samata Party leader and Defence Minister George Fernandes who has been authorised by the BJP to work out a poll alliance between BJP and TDP. "In any case, the chief minister will decide all these issues only during the second week of May," TDP sources claim.

Meanwhile the Anna-Telugu Desam Party, floated in January this year by TDP patriarch, late N T Rama Rao's son, Nandamuri Harikrishna, is seeking to forge a poll alliance with the two left parties for the ensuing Lok Sabha and assembly elections in Andhra Pradesh. The Anna-TDP leaders Dr Daggubati Venkateswara Rao and Dr Yarlagadda Lakshmi Prasad are planning to meet the leaders of CPI and CPI-M during the first week of May for preliminary discussions on a poll pact.

The left parties have ruled out any truck with the ruling Telugu Desam Party led by Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu as well as any understanding with NTR-TDP, led by NTR's widow Lakshmi Parvathi. They are also averse to even a limited understanding with the Congress for the Lok Sabha snap polls. However, the leftist leaders have responded positively to the feelers for a tie-up with the Anna-TDP. According to Daggubati, the Anna-TDP favours the poll alliance for the Lok Sabha as well as assembly polls, whether they are held separately or simultaneously, in the state.

The Anna-TDP, he made it clear, does not want to have any alliance with the two other formations in the state -- the Congress and the BJP. The Anna-TDP is also lukewarm to Lakshmi Parvathi's open offer to cooperate with her step-son Harikrishna to ensure the defeat of the TDP led by her step-son-in-law and bete noire (Chandrababu Naidu). During the 1995 family and party coup against N T Rama Rao, Chandrababu Naidu had successfully roped in N Harikrishna (NTR's maverick son) and Daggubati (NTR's elder son-in-law) to topple NTR to save the party and government from the machinations of NTR's second wife Lakshmi Parvathi who was allegedly functioning as an extra-constitutional authority those days. Harikrishna was prodded to take on the dushta shakti (evil force, i.e. Lakshmi Parvathi).

Within a couple of months after the August 1995 coup, Daggubati left the Chandrababu camp and rejoined NTR. After NTR's death in January 1996, Lakshmi Parvathi floated NTR-TDP and made Daggubati its working president. However, Daggubati left the NTR-TDP and sailed with the BJP for sometime in 1998. He was even made a vice-president of the state BJP. But early this year, Daggubati left the BJP after Harikrishna floated the Anna-TDP.

Like Daggubati, Harikrishna was also shabbily treated by Chandrababu Naidu. After the coup, Harikrishna was inducted as transport minister by Chandrababu Naidu. As Harikrishna failed to get elected to the state assembly within the stipulated six months of his becoming minister, he had to quit his cabinet post. Subsequently, in April 1996, Harikrishna was elected from Hindupur assembly constituency earlier represented by his father but Chandrababu Naidu did not re-induct him into the cabinet. Harikrishna was given the ornamental post of Telugu Yuvatha (youth wing) chief.

After floating the Anna-TDP soon after NTR's death anniversary in January this year, Harikrishna quit his assembly seat and undertook a tour of the three regions of the state in three spells. He addressed nearly 500 public meetings in as many as 160 assembly constituencies in 18 districts. However, early this month, he suspended his tour of the coastal districts mid-way after suffering a serious back-ache problem. He was admitted into a nursing home in Hyderabad and recently discharged. He is now recuperating at his home. The doctors have reportedly advised him rest for the next two or three months.

Presently, the Anna-TDP leadership consists of Harikrishna, Daggubati, Yarlagadda, Cuddapah zilla parishad chairman Dr N Tulasi Reddy and Shyampet MLA S Madhusudhanachary. Except for Harikrishna, the others are no crowd-pullers. So far, the Anna-TDP has attracted local leaders and activists from the NTR-TDP and nobody from the ruling TDP has joined its ranks. The Anna-TDP has plans to field its candidates in about 100 to 150 assembly constituencies and 10 to 15 Lok Sabha constituencies. The party has also demanded simultaneous elections to the Lok Sabha and assembly in the state. Daggubati has urged the election commission to hold simultaneous polls sometime in September after the electoral rolls are revised.

Daggubati has ridiculed Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu's plea to the Election Commission to hold the Lok Sabha polls in June/July on the specious ground that Andhra Pradesh is prone to cyclones from September to November. "The State will be reeling under a heat wave in May and June. Moreover, cyclones in September and October are not a regular phenomenon," he pointed out.

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