BJP president Amit Shah’s call for an aggressive membership drive in Andhra Pradesh has sent alarm bells ringing in the Telugu Desam Party (TDP).

BJP president Amit Shah’s call for an aggressive membership drive in Andhra Pradesh has sent alarm bells ringing in the Telugu Desam Party. There has been no public show of acrimony yet, but the signs of discomfort are visible in the TDP, which is an alliance partner of the BJP in the ruling NDA at the Centre.

Amit Shah’s message was loud and clear to the party cadres. He wanted the party to enroll 45 lakh members by accelerating the membership drive in Andhra. The mission is to win at least 70 constituencies in the 175-member state assembly and have 100 members enrolled in every polling station.

His message to the TDP was a bit convoluted though. "We are coalition partners and we will continue our poll pact," he conveyed to the latter, however, in the same vein he told BJP workers "not need to hesitate to admit anyone from any party into the BJP," making it clear that he gave a green signal for the party leaders in the state to entrap even those from the TDP.

This surely is a reason for worry for Chandrababu Naidu, who has been busy singing paeans to the Narendra Modi administration. Union Minister of State Nirmala Sitaraman’s assertion that the BJP did not require anybody’s nod for expanding in Andhra Pradesh and enrolling members is a direct message to the TDP.

Ironically for the TDP, which was pulling the strings from behind the scene in its earlier stint of NDA between 1998 and 2004, politics has gone topsy-turvy. Though the BJP-TDP combo returned to the helm now, the BJP no longer needs the support of the TDP. It is the BJP which is now being condescending towards Naidu, for very obvious reasons.

Though the BJP is as much responsible as the Congress is in the separation of Andhra Pradesh, Naidu is not in a position to ruffle the feathers of the BJP. His mega promises of a Singapore-type of capital city for AP, waiver of farm loans, 13 airports, 14 seaports, jobs to every household and numerous other promises won’t take shape without a massive financial aid from the Centre. The BJP is dodging and ducking on the special status for AP owing to its own pan-Indian political compulsions. Wherever it is doling out largesse, it surely wants to claim credit for them.



The BJP doesn’t want residuary traffic of the TDP to be diverted to its activity. Instead, it wants to grow organically and generate direct traffic – voters – to add to its kitty. Shahs told the party leaders to spread even to rural areas, as the party still remained the darling of just the urban voters. This means that they should be proactive and ensure that the growth of the TDP is stymied.

Chandrababu Naidu is swallowing the bitter pills popped into his mouth by some BJP leaders grudgingly, while his benefactor M Venkaiah Naidu is gripped by a sense of compunction, for the latter is unable to toe the line of his bosom friend Chandrababu Naidu and at the same time stop the BJP juggernaut in its tracks.

Though some of the new entrants like former Union Ministers Kavuri Sambasiva Rao and Daggubati Purandeswari and former Minister in AP Kanna Lakshminarayana have already begun to launch the fireworks impaling the follies of the TDP regime, especially in the case of farm loan waivers, they were advised against preaching fire and brimstone from a white pine pulpit. Not, at least, for now.

However, Amit Shah indicated that it would just be a conjecture of time before the BJP cadres stop singing paeans to the joint venture with the TDP and start questioning and eventually raising the banner of revolt. For now, he smoked the proverbial peace pipe. Naidu too made sure that his point man in the Union Cabinet M Venkaiah Naidu is around when Amit Shah is moving about in Andhra Pradesh.

An MLA from the YSR Congress G Srikanth Reddy said in a TV talk show that the surge of the BJP at the cost of the TDP was just a pipe dream as long as Venkaiah Naidu was at the helm of affairs at the Centre.

On his part, Chandrababu Naidu is treading more cautiously than ever, appeasing all leaders in the BJP, for he perceives threat from them, while he has the YSR Congress, which is getting “weakened” in the eyes of the TDP-friendly media, to oppose every act of his, no matter what the denouement would be.

Several Congress leaders, who were sure of being rendered jobless in the aftermath of the general elections last year, already sought refuge in the BJP. Former Union Ministers like Kavuri Samba Siva Rao and Daggubati Purandeswari donned the saffron before the elections, while the BJP allured some senior Congress leaders like Kanna Lakshminarayana into its fold. Speculation was rife that several leaders including the last Chief Minister of united Andhra Pradesh N Kiran Kumar Reddy and last APCC president in united Andhra Pradesh Botcha Satyanarayana and a host of other leaders too would embrace the BJP.

But Amit Shah clarified that there were no such high profile joining this time.

A two-time Congress MP and industrial heavyweight is said to be lobbying for the entry of these leaders into the BJP is said to be working overtime on getting in more leaders into the party.

Though the BJP leadership is suggesting that it is trying to fill the political vacuum by enticing many leaders into its fold, it surely has plans to undercut into the Telugu Desam Party. However, it still is peace time in the political marriage between the BJP and the TDP, with some differences of opinion. What is going to unfold is, however, anybody’s guess.