The Bhartiya Janata Party’s attempt to secure more than 400 seats in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections got a major boost after the Telugu Desam Party (TDP), along with the Jana Sena Party (JSP), decided to join the BJPled National Democratic Alliance (NDA). The entry of the two parties into the NDA fold was announced in a joint press statement by BJP national president Jagat Prakash Nadda, TDP president N. Chandrababu Naidu and Jana Sena Party president Pawan Kalyan.
Party sources aware of the development told The Sunday Guardian that the BJP is likely to contest on 5 seats, 3 are likely to go to Jan Sena, while the TDP will contest on the remaining 17. In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the TDP had contested on 21 and gave four seats to the BJP. The BJP had won on two, while the TDP emerged victorious on 15 seats. In the Assembly elections, which coincide with the Lok Sabha polls, the BJP will contest on 6-8 seats, the Jan Sena on 22-24 and the TDP on 145. The Assembly has 175 members.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the TDP, whose seat share had come down from 15 that it got in 2014 to three, had retained its vote share of 40% that it had got in the previous election. Multiple surveys conducted by the TDP and other organizations have predicted the party will win a minimum of 17 seats.
By allying with one of the biggest political parties active in South India, the BJP has expanded the NDA and made the possibility of the alliance reaching the 400- seat mark more achievable, given that it had got the maximum number of seats it possibly can from the Hindi belt seats of North India and hence needs to target states, specifically those in southern part of India, where it has no or minimum presence.
Another major benefit of this alliance that the BJP is likely to get is to stop the Congress from reaching the figure of 100-125 Lok Sabha seats. The Congress, realising that the BJP was the weakest in the South, is expecting to win most of its seats from this region. However, the BJP strategists are trying to stop the Congress from touching 100 seats by tying up with regional parties who are more capable to defeat the Congress candidates than the BJP.
Party sources in the TDP and BJP said that the alliance modalities were worked out by Home Minister Amit Shah and Nara Lokesh, son of Chandrababu Naidu. BJP sources told The Sunday Guardian that a joint rally comprising Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chandrababu Naidu and Pawan Kalyan is likely to happen on 17 or 18 March in Guntur. The BJP and TDP, while confirming that the first formal step to secure this alliance was initiated from Delhi by central BJP leaders, said that the talks succeeded because of the winwin result that the alliance is likely to bring for both the parties.
According to them, there was no acrimony between the top leadership of the two parties, despite the snapping of ties in 2018, which helped them move ahead with the alliance talks swiftly. For the TDP, a loss in these polls would have dented the party severally as it has been out of power both at the state and the Centre for five years now and another five years without power would have likely proved catastrophic for the party, which had walked out of the NDA in 2018. Speaking to The Sunday Guardian from Hyderabad, senior TDP leader and national spokesperson, Professor Jyothsna Tirunagari, said that the seat distribution would be finalized by the party leaders within a day or two. “The BJP and TDP have a very old relationship together.
The TDP had joined NDA in 1996. We were never against the BJP on matters of principle, we are natural allies but we had issue-based differences and all those have been sorted. The people of Andhra Pradesh have made up their mind to ensure victory for Chandra Babu Naidu and Narendra Modi and this victory will come as a boon for the people of the state,” said Jyothsna, who has been president of Telangana Telugu Mahila.
The 73-year-old Chandrababu Naidu, party sources said, read the expected “Modi-wave” and decided to rejoin the NDA. This alliance is also likely to help Naidu, his son and his party members from being subjected to what the TDP leaders have called a “political witch-hunt” by the Y. Jagan Reddyled Yuvajana Sramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP) government in the state. “The Modi government at the Centre runs things ‘strongly’ and we as an ally can expect that our leaders will not be subjected to the injustice that we have been facing at the hands of the Jagan government now that we have joined the NDA,” a TDP leader told The Sunday Guardian.
TDP leaders told The Sunday Guardian that the perception that the BJP was a silent partner of YSRCP had gained traction in the state and the anti-incumbency that Jagan has accumulated was rubbing on the BJP leaders, which the BJP seems to have realised. This prompted them to reach out to the TDP.
BJP and TDP leaders told this newspaper that BJP needed an entry in the South where it has failed to do well except in Karnataka and by getting Chandrababu Naidu on their side, who is perceived by his supporters as amongst the tallest political figures of South India, the BJP will get advantage of this alliance in other states too including Telangana and Tamil Nadu. In the 2019 Assembly elections, the BJP candidates had lost deposits on all the 175 seats that the party had contested in Andhra Pradesh.