By Surya Kumar
Visakhapatnam: Bharatiya Janata Party, which under its ‘Operation Mission South’ wants to contest 80 Lok Sabha seats in the Southern States has found itself in a fix with its alliance partner ‘power star’ Pawan Kalyan-led Jana Sena Party giving enough indications on its plans to contest elections in 2024 by tying up with Telugu Desam Party (TDP).
In his address at a mammoth gathering of youth at Ranasthalam in Srikakulam district, about 100 km from here on Friday, Pawan Kalyan said there is an urgent need to prevent split in the opposition votes to dislodge the YSR Congress Party Government, which he accused of trying to suppress the voice of TDP, JSP and other parties. The party, he said, has issued controversial GO No. 1 banning political roadshows and rallies on highways and other venues.
The GO was subsequently stayed for sometime by AP High Court on a PIL filed by CPI.
The JSP founder said, “We have to learn from our experience of winning just one seat in 2019 despite obtaining 6.9% vote share. This happened due to lack of strategic alliances. This time we will not commit such mistakes to defeat YSRCP-led by Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, which is firm on political vendetta against the opposition activists.”
He said he had a luncheon meeting recently with TDP national president and former Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu in Hyderabad and resolved to fight against YSRCP’s anti-democratic decisions unitedly.
The BJP which aligned with Pawan Kalyan after the 2019 elections has failed to take up programmes jointly. Though Pawan Kalyan was invited to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his visit to Visakhapatnam in November, he still went ahead to have his second one-to-one meeting with Naidu three months ago.
JSP campaigned in support of BJP-TDP alliance in 2014 but abstained from fielding candidates of its own. The Modi-Pawan Kalyan meeting in Visakhapatnam was dubbed in political circles as an attempt to dissuade the latter not to walk out of the BJP alliance as he is a crowd-puller. BJP lacks any charismatic leader who can attract crowds in the State. M. Venkaiah Naidu, the tallest leader BJP produced from AP, has retired from politics after serving as Vice President of India.
BJP, which is drawing strategies to retain power in 2024, is treading cautiously about the decisions being taken by Pawan Kalyan. Its frontline leaders have not made any remarks on JSP’s close interactions with the TDP leadership. Political observers feel that BJP leadership, mainly Union Home Minister Amit Shah and BJP national president J.P. Nadda in consultation with the Prime Minister may also opt to align with TDP at the eleventh hour. At present, BJP and YSRCP have a blow hot, blow cold relationship though the AP’s ruling party supports the Centre in all crucial legislations and debates in the Parliament.
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