In the last four years, the BJP’s efforts to expand its base into parts of South India — including Andhra Pradesh — have faltered to quite an extent.
Now, with just nine months for the Lok Sabha elections and little time to revitalise the party, it appears the BJP has realised its “real strength”.
It is now pinning its hopes on TDP founder NT Rama Rao’s daughter and former Union minister Daggubati Puradeswari to at least stay afloat for now, and then make some moves after the 2024 polls.
In the last four years, the BJP has changed the chief of its Andhra Pradesh unit abruptly, devised a customised “Andhra strategy”, inducted the TDP’s Rajya Sabha members hoping there will be an exodus from the Opposition party in the state, conducted 5,000 whistle-stop meetings, and unleashed “Operation Akarsh”.
But all those attempts appear to have fallen flat, with no prominent leader showing up to join the BJP.
Barring, former chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy, who has been inactive in politics, no prominent politician from either the TDP or the YSRCP has shown interest in the BJP in Andhra Pradesh.
The saffron party, which polled less than NOTA in the 2019 Lok Sabha and Andhra Pradesh Assembly polls in the state, appears to be now hoping that after the 2024 polls either the TDP or the YSRCP will be weakened enough so as to create a space for the BJP in the state’s political arena.
And to occupy that space, the BJP central leadership had appointed Purandeswari, who represents a powerful and influential community in Andhra politics, as its face in the state.
So, what could be the reason for the BJP suddenly appointing someone who was a Union minister and comes from an influential community with a strong political legacy and clout?
All these years, the saffron party either played second fiddle to the ruling party for a major part of the TDP’s term, or remained an insignificant rabble-rouser.
Picking Purandeswari to lead the party in Andhra Pradesh can be seen as an indication of the BJP trying to woo the powerful, influential, and wealthy Kamma community that has traditionally supported the TDP.
Except for TDP Rajya Sabha members Sujana Chowdhary, TG Venkatesh, Garikapati Ra Mohan Rao, and CM Ramesh, no other prominent leader joined the BJP from the TDP in recent times.Inducting these leaders was also an operation by the central leadership.
Purandeswari joined the BJP from the Congress just before the 2014 Lok Sabha and Assembly polls.She unsuccessfully contested the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha polls as a BJP candidate.
BJP insiders opine that the party always wanted to utilise the legacy of “NTR’s daughter” to gain some strength in Andhra Pradesh.Not to ruffle feathers within the TDP between 2014 and 2018, the BJP — as an ally — kept Puarndeswari idle.
Now, that the saffron party wants to gain strength by bringing in leaders from other parties, especially from the TDP — in Andhra Pradesh, Purandeswari has been chosen to lead the party in the state.
Setting in motion its plan of action last year to land big fish — mainly from the TDP — to create a buzz, the party deployed at least 10 Union ministers to address whistle-stop meetings between 17 September and 2 October, Gandhi Jayanti.
But, the BJP utterly failed to create any such buzz.
