india

Updated: Feb 18, 2019 10:44 IST

YSR Congress president Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy on Sunday unveiled a ‘Backward Class declaration’ at a rally in Eluru of West Godavari district with a heavy focus on freebies to woo the numerically strong community ahead of the assembly elections after chief minister and TDP supremo N Chandrababu Naidu announced a slew of sops last month.

The freebies promised under the declaration include an ex-gratia of Rs 7 lakh to the families at times of death of their breadwinners under YSR Bheema Yojana, allocation of Rs 75,000 cr for welfare of 139 communities within the backward castes in the next five years, non-refundable financial assistance of Rs 75,000 for each BC woman in four instalments over a period of four years, 50 per cent of quota in nominated government posts for BCs, SCs, STs and Muslim minorities, zero interest loans for petty vendors, annual assistance of Rs 10,000 for each Nayee Bramhin family etc.

Reddy’s announcement came after Naidu announced a slew of sops estimated to cost Rs 3,000cr, corporations for many castes within the backward classes and a sub-plan with a provision for one thirds of the allocations in the state budget for BC welfare at the ruling Telugu Desam Party’s ‘Jai Ho BC’ rally held in Rajahmundry of the neighbouring East Godavari district on January 27.

Naidu is working hard to check the possible erosion of his party’s vote bank among backward classes who constitute 46.2 per cent of the state’s electorate of 3.69 crore after his government’s announced five per cent job quota for Kapus. Jaganmohan Reddy, who lost power by a slender margin of less than two per cent votes in 2014, is seeking to leverage the Kapu-BC rift over quota to win the elections.

Reddy invoked his father and former chief minister late Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy several times depicting him as a messiah of BCs with a vow to continue all the schemes he had introduced for welfare of the backward classes.

Kapus and backward classes determine the election trends in East and West Godavari districts with 34 seats in the 175-member state assembly due to their numbers.

Reddy did not address the political aspirations of the backward classes at his rally and it did not go unnoticed.

E. Venkatesh, professor in political science from University of Hyderabad, commented that Reddy lacked a new agenda to wean the backward castes away from the TDP fold which was evident at the rally. “Reddy limited himself to extending certain economic incentives to backward classes without addressing their political aspirations,” he said.

Backward Classes have remained the backbone for the TDP since its emergence in 1982 even as the leaders at the helm in the Congress then and the YSR Congress are seen as parties denying their political representation.

Angirekula Varaprasad, president of the Andhra Pradesh Backward Classes Welfare Association, said the Reddy’s BC declaration devoid of an assurance on allotment of Assembly and Parliament seats for the community was quite disappointing.

“There was no talk of BC quota in the legislative bodies which remained pending since the period of YSR government and there was no mention of his party’s commitment on the number of seats to be allotted for BCs either,” he commented.

The association urged the ruling TDP and the YSR Congress to reserve at least 75 Assembly seats and 9 out of 25 lok Sabha seats in the state for BCs in proportion to their representation in the state population.