Alarm bells for Jagan as crowds surge in Naidu's roadshows across AP

New Delhi: The stampede at Telugu Desam Party (TDP) supremo N Chandrababu Naidu's roadshow at Kandukur in Nellore district on Wednesday indicated a surge in the popularity of the former Andhra Pradesh chief minister across the state.

At least eight people died in the stampede. The TDP chief was in Kandukuru for his three-day tour as part of the party’s ‘Idemi Kharma Mana Rashtraniki (Why is our state facing this fate?)' campaign launched for the 2024 assembly elections in the state.

Naidu, 72, has announced that the 2024 polls would be the last electoral battle of his political career if the people of Andhra Pradesh do not elect him as the chief minister, and he is leaving no stone unturned to regain power in the state. He has been holding a series of public meetings highlighting the alleged failures of the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) government and chief minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy.

Naidu was buoyed by the success of Mahanadu, the TDP’s annual conclave, and since then there has been a visible resurgence of his party. His "Quit Jagan, save AP" slogan is getting good traction on the ground.

In January, Naidu's son, Nara Lokesh, will start a 4,000-km march to woo the youth of the state. Titled "Yuva Galam", it will encourage the youth to raise their voice and fight for what they deserve.

Jagan had come to power in 2019 with a resounding mandate. The TDP had been decimated.

The YSRCP government inherited a state that was in a financial mess to the extent that the union finance ministry has been imposing a plethora of restrictions on its permitted borrowings.

In fact, Jagan met Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi on Wednesday to seek his intervention in lifting the curbs on borrowings. He told the Prime Minister that the state will suffer financially if the restrictions continue unabated, especially at a time when the country is set to fight the new Covid variant.

That said, the Jagan government is facing a severe anti-incumbency in less than four years, a reason why Naidu’s rallies are well received.

YSRCP leaders argue that the chief minister should have released a white paper on the state of finances in Andhra Pradesh when he came to power in 2019. The pending bills left behind by the TDP regime then were to the tune of Rs 60,000 crore.

They feel it was a mistake to not put the facts in public domain after the party came to power. The state’s economic condition worsened due to the Covid though Andhra Pradesh along with Maharashtra, Kerala and Tamil Nadu was one of four states that performed well during the pandemic.

But Jagan is also facing resentment from his own party workers who are not happy with the present power structure within the organisation. The cadre feels that he gets too swayed by the bureaucracy which is trying to score brownie points. It is unlikely that they will fight with the same zeal as they did in 2019.

Besides, the YSRCP organisational structure has visibly collapsed after it came to power. Though Jagan is considered to be a good and compassionate leader, the thin line between politics and running the administration is getting eroded. There have been administrative failures.

The internal assessment suggests that while the YSRCP remains popular in Rayalaseema except Ongole, mainly due to its mining policy, it is facing resentment in Guntur because of the raging issue of the new capital of the state following the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh and creation of Telangana in 2014.

In Visakhapatnam in North Andhra, the mess created by one of his trusted lieutenants has done irreparable damage to the party and that is the reason why Naidu is getting an overwhelming response there.

But it remains to be seen if he is able to dislodge the Jagan government on his own or will seek the support of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Pawan Kalyan’s Jana Sena Party.