Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Mar 9: After prolonged negotiations, the BJP has formed an alliance in Andhra Pradesh with the Telegu Desam Party (TDP) and actor-turned-politician Pawan Kalyan’s JanaSena Party for the coming Lok Sabha and the state Assembly elections.
Calling it a “win-win situation for the country and Andhra Pradesh,” the TDP president N Chandrababu Naidu on Saturday announced the alliance of his party with the BJP and JanaSena Party for the upcoming Lok Sabha and Assembly elections. The BJP in an official release, also confirmed the alliance and added that the modalities of seat sharing will be deliberated within a day or two.
On the prospects of the TDP-BJP-JanaSena alliance in the general elections and the Andhra Pradesh Assembly polls, Naidu asserted that it will be a “clean sweep.”
BJP chief JP Nadda, in a post on X, said, “I wholeheartedly welcome the decision of N Chandrababu Naidu and Pawan Kalyan to join the NDA family. Under the dynamic and visionary leadership of PM Narendra Modi, the BJP, TDP and JSP are committed to the progress of the country and the upliftment of the state and people of Andhra Pradesh.”
The announcement comes hours after Naidu held the second round of talks with Union Home Minister Amit Shah and BJP president J P Nadda on Saturday as the two parties worked to seal their alliance for the upcoming polls. Lok Sabha and assembly polls will be held simultaneously in Andhra Pradesh.
Talks had been going on between the leaders of the three parties for several days, and resumed on Friday. Senior TDP leader and Rajya Sabha MP K Ravindra Kumar had on Friday said the BJP, the Jana Sena, and his party have decided in principle to work together for upcoming polls and the modalities are being worked out.
While the TDP and BJP had been allies earlier, Naidu broke the tie-up in 2018, citing the failure of the Centre to give Andhra Pradesh special category status as a reason. If that was a political move ahead of the 2019 elections, it had backfired on the TDP miserably. Since then, Naidu has been trying to claw his way back into the NDA camp.
The alliance would also be a huge boost to the BJP which has been seeking to expand the NDA to meet its target of winning 400 seats in the Lok Sabha elections. Announcing the deal, Mr Naidu claimed that the alliance would sweep the Assembly elections in the state. “Andhra Pradesh has been destroyed badly. The BJP and the TDP coming together is a win-win situation for the country and the state,” the former chief minister said.
A joint statement by the three parties emphasised the long relationship between the TDP and the BJP. “The BJP and TDP have a very old relationship together. The TDP joined NDA in 1996 and has worked together successfully in Atalji (former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee) and Narendra Modiji’s government. In 2014, the TDP and the BJP fought the Lok Sabha election and Assembly election together,” the statement said.
Mr Naidu and Mr Kalyan held a meeting with senior BJP leader and Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday and a deal was hammered out. Sources said while the BJP wanted to contest 10 out of the 25 Lok Sabha seats in Andhra Pradesh, the TDP made it clear that it was the primary opposition party in the state.
Sources said the formula which has been arrived at is that the TDP will fight 17 Lok Sabha seats while the BJP will be allotted six and the JSP will contest from two. The details of exactly which constituencies will be allotted to each party will be worked out after a BJP team visits Andhra Pradesh.
The TDP had been a part of the NDA until 2018 when Mr Naidu – who was the Andhra Pradesh chief minister at the time – had walked out of the coalition over financial support for the state. The alliance with the BJP was crucial for his party this time around after a humiliating defeat at the hands of the Jagan Mohan Reddy-led YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) in 2019.
The YSRCP had won 22 out of the 25 Lok Sabha Seats and 151 out of 175 Assembly constituencies while the TDP had managed to achieve victory in just three and 23, respectively. The alliance also marks a shift for the BJP, which has been supported by the YSRCP on several occasions, especially in getting bills passed in the Rajya Sabha. It will, however, help the national party gain a foothold in the southern states, where it is perceived to be relatively weak.
Having won just 29 of the 130 Lok Sabha constituencies in the southern region in 2019, the party is keenly aware that it will have to significantly better that score to reach its target of securing 370 seats on its own and 400 for the NDA. The Congress, which had also failed to win even a single seat in the Lok Sabha and Assembly polls in Andhra Pradesh in 2019, is hoping for a better performance this time after roping in YS Sharmila, who is the sister of Jagan Mohan Reddy. Riding high on its twin successes in the Telangana and Karnataka Assembly polls last year, the party is expecting that they will have an impact in the other southern states as well.