Former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu on Saturday, June 3, met Union Home Minister Amit Shah, heightening speculation about the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) returning to the ruling BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA). In the last four years since the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) came to power in Andhra Pradesh, Naidu has hinted at his regret over leaving the NDA on many occasions, triggering speculation in Andhra Pradesh’s political circles of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and TDP soon rekindling their alliance in the state. Saturday night’s meeting between Naidu, Amit Shah, and BJP’s national president JP Nadda has now boosted these expectations.
TDP leaders from Andhra Pradesh told TNM that Naidu met Amit Shah around 9.30 pm on Saturday at the latter's residence in Delhi. While speculation is rife that the meeting was held to discuss an alliance for the upcoming Telangana Assembly elections at the end of 2023, BJP leaders from Telangana said this was unlikely to happen.
In 2018, Naidu quit the NDA over the Union government’s refusal to grant special category status (SCS) for Andhra Pradesh, a demand which has not been met to date. A few months later, in neighbouring Telangana, the TDP even joined hands with the Congress, its lifelong foe, for the 2018 state Assembly elections and the 2019 general elections.
A senior TDP leader from Andhra Pradesh said that Naidu's latest meeting with Amit Shah is in line with the party's plan to strike up an alliance before the 2024 general and Assembly elections in AP. “We have also been in talks with Pawan Kalyan's Jana Sena Party (JSP) to contest together against the YSRCP,” he added.
The TDP in 2019 faced its worst electoral defeat against the ruling YSR Congress Party (YSRCP), led by Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy. Naidu's party, which contested alone, won only 23 out of 175 Assembly seats, while the ruling YSRCP won 151 seats in a landslide victory. Pawan Kalyan’s JSP, which had supported the BJP-TDP alliance back in 2014, contested the 2019 elections in an alliance with the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), CPI and CPI(M), and managed to win only one seat.
Since the 2019 electoral defeat, the TDP had refrained from criticising the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi over many issues raised by other Opposition parties, to avoid causing more fissures. “We were asked not to censure the BJP post the COVID pandemic. The TDP-BJP alliance is very likely to be announced closer to the elections in Andhra Pradesh (which will coincide with the 2024 general elections),” the TDP leader told TNM.
Meanwhile, the TDP has also begun attempts to revive its Telangana unit. In November last year, Naidu appointed Kasani Gnaneshwar Mudiraj, an OBC (Other Backward Classes) leader, as the president of the party’s Telangana unit. A month later, the former CM addressed a public meeting in Telangana’s Khammam district, which shares a border with Andhra Pradesh and has a large population of the Kamma community to which Naidu belongs. At the event, he said that the huge turnout indicated that TDP would regain its past glory in the state. The TDP in Telangana has lost its relevance and become virtually non-existent after its disastrous performance in the 2018 Telangana Assembly polls.
In the 2018 Telangana elections, the TDP managed to win just two Assembly seats out of the 14 it contested in alliance with the Congress. Both seats were in the Khammam district, and both legislators later switched to the ruling Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS). The Congress itself won just 19 seats in the 119-member Telangana Assembly. The K Chandrashekar Rao-led BRS (then TRS) won 88 seats, and 12 Congress MLAs defected to the ruling party within months.
"The BJP in Telangana does not want the TDP for an alliance because we want to win our own base. Naidu's party is almost finished here, and the only thing they can do is help us in seats where there are Andhra settlers. As far as the alliance is concerned, maybe it will be announced later, with an understanding to provide support in Telangana unofficially for the 2023 polls," said a BJP leader from Hyderabad, when asked about the Naidu-Shah meeting.
The TDP leader from AP who spoke to TNM also stated that poll alliance announcements will be made only closer to the elections. "If we do it now, then we will have to start formally discussing seat sharing," he added.