Shah’s meet with Chandrababu sets off talk of BJP-TDP reunion. Jagan’s Delhi trip thickens Andhra buzz

Shah’s meet with Chandrababu sets off talk of BJP-TDP reunion. Jagan’s Delhi trip thickens Andhra buzz

Hyderabad: Exactly five years after he publicly announced that the NDA’s doors are permanently shut for “opportunist” Chandrababu Naidu, BJP chief strategist Amit Shah received the TDP supremo at his residence in New Delhi late night Wednesday.

Neither side formally disclosed what transpired inside, but sources in both parties said Naidu and Shah explored the possibility of re-entering into an alliance — with Pawan Kalyan’s Jana Sena being the third partner — for the upcoming Lok Sabha and assembly polls.

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy also reached New Delhi Thursday and met the BJP leadership, including PM Narendra Modi, Friday.

Sources in the Andhra Chief Minister’s Office (CMO), however, said the visit was official, adding that Jagan requested the PM for fulfillment of guarantees made at the time of the state’s bifurcation, including special category status for Andhra Pradesh and funds for Polavaram project.

He also met Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. The buzz was that the YSRCP chief would meet Shah too, but Jagan subsequently returned to Amaravati.

Union Home Minister Shah had met Naidu once last year too, in June 2023.

The latest meeting, also attended by BJP chief J.P. Nadda, can be viewed as “an opening discussion” to examine the prospects and arrive at a possible understanding/seat-sharing for fighting the polls together in Andhra Pradesh, sources in New Delhi told ThePrint.

The state will vote simultaneously for its assembly and the Lok Sabha in two months.

The Naidu-Shah-Nadda meet took place as some opinion surveys are projecting a favourable outcome for the Opposition in Andhra. The India Today Mood of the Nation survey, released Thursday, projected 17 seats for the TDP, and eight for the ruling YSR Congress Party, out of the state’s total 25 Lok Sabha seats.

The TDP-BJP had together won 17 seats in Andhra in 2014, while the YSRCP had got eight.

Shah’s Wednesday meeting with Naidu follows the BJP’s patch-up with Nitish Kumar in Bihar. BJP leaders had also used the “doors permanently closed” expression when Kumar’s JD(U) exited the NDA in 2022.

While the BJP has now apparently taken a reconciliatory approach with former allies, as it targets the 400-mark figure for the NDA in the Lok Sabha elections, the TDP too, political observers say, is anxious to regain power from Jaganmohan Reddy’s YSRCP.

“For this, our party needs the friendship of the BJP, in rule at the Centre and in control of various agencies, in addition to JSP (Jana Sena) support,” a TDP leader told ThePrint.

In 2014, the TDP-led alliance with the BJP and the JSP had won the Andhra assembly election, powered by the Modi wave and Pawan Kalyan’s popularity.

However, when the three separated in 2019, Jaganmohan Reddy stormed to power.

In 2019, the YSRCP bagged 49.95 percent of the vote, while the TDP got 39.17, JSP around six percent, and the BJP, less than one percent.

The TDP and the Jana Sena reunited in September last year with the agenda of dislodging Jagan. Pawan Kalyan, officially a BJP ally, says he has been impressing upon Shah on the need to rejoin the alliance.

While Naidu returned to Amaravati, in a significant development, YSRCP chief and CM Jagan arrived in New Delhi Thursday evening to meet the PM and some ministers Friday.

Speaking to ThePrint, an AP BJP leader described this as an indication that the BJP high-command is still weighing options. “Unless they wanted to send out a message, I think, Jagan’s tour would not be happening a day after Naidu’s. The party might slant either way in the coming days.”

Although Jagan has been steadfastly supportive of the Modi government in the passage of various bills in Parliament, party sources said, he cannot officially ally with the BJP because of his strong minority vote bank in the state.

The TDP expects some of the Muslims — who they say are “disillusioned with Jagan’s administration” — to vote for it this time. Muslims constitute over nine percent of AP’s population, and their votes are crucial in around 30 seats, out of the total 175 assembly constituencies, mainly in Rayalaseema, Nellore and Guntur areas.

“True, alliance with the BJP would again discourage Muslims from voting for us. But the strong anti-Jagan sentiment, we expect, would supersede communal sentiments,” Somireddy Chandramohan Reddy, a senior TDP leader and former minister from Nellore region, said.

The indication is that Naidu is offering 30 assembly seats and around six Lok Sabha seats to the BJP-JSP.

“We are part of the NDA and want the BJP to join our electoral alliance with the TDP in AP,” Nadendla Manohar, JSP political affairs committee chairman, told ThePrint.

“So, some sacrifices might have to be made for achieving the larger goal of rescuing the state from Jagan’s ruinous rule.”

TDP-BJP spiteful split

In February 2019, about a year after the TDP snapped ties with the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance citing broken promises to the residual state like special category status, Shah, then the BJP president, called Naidu “corrupt, an opportunist and a U-turn CM”.

“NDA doors are permanently closed for the TDP,” Shah had said at rallies in AP ahead of the 2019 polls.

Earlier, TDP leaders like MLA Nandamuri Balakrishna publicly made scornful remarks about the BJP, Shah and Modi in April 2018, prompting BJP cadres to demand the arrest of the actor-politician who is also Naidu’s brother-in-law.

In May 2018, some TDP workers allegedly pelted stones at Shah’s convoy in temple town Tirupati.

In his capacity as CM, in February 2019, Naidu also sat on a dharna that he called the ‘Dharma Porata Deeksha’ in New Delhi, seeking special category status for AP from the Modi government.

Much like Nitish, Naidu also joined the Congress-led camp and the TDP contested the 2018 Telangana polls in alliance with the party. Naidu and Rahul Gandhi even shared the stage in election rallies, accusing Modi of causing hardships for people with decisions such as demonetisation, GST etc.

However, since the 2019 loss, which reduced the TDP to 23 MLAs and three MPs, Naidu, sources said, has been regretting snapping ties — that, too, acrimoniously — with the BJP, which managed to retain power at the Centre in a much better performance than in 2014.

Although Naidu made several attempts for rapprochement in the past few years, the BJP, which banked on the YSRCP’s timely support in the passage of several bills in Parliament, has remained non-committal to the TDP.

While BJP’s central leaders are reticent about the Naidu-Nadda-Shah meet agenda, AP BJP leaders said they are preparing ground for the BJP’s fight in all the constituencies and will do so till the time an alliance is sealed and seat-sharing is announced.

The party polled under one percent votes in the last elections. Kanna Lakshminarayana, who led the BJP in the 2019 polls, joined the TDP last February.

Incumbent Andhra Pradesh BJP chief is Daggubati Purandeswari, Naidu’s sister-in-law, whom Jagan accuses of operating as the TDP chief’s agent in the BJP. Last week, she opened the party’s election offices in the 25 Lok Sabha constituencies.

Accusing the Jagan government of diverting central funds like for the Mahatma Gandhi-NREGA to its accounts, Purandeswari has asked the cadres to be ready for polls in two months.

Meanwhile, Sajjala Ramakrishna Reddy, the YSRCP’s all powerful general secretary and adviser to the CM, said Naidu needs alliances for survival as the “TDP is on a ventilator.”

“Naidu has allied with every party for electoral gains and his desperation for the BJP alliance shows his weakness,” Sajjala told reporters in Amaravati Thursday.

(Edited by Sunanda Ranjan)