Hyderabad, April 14: What Y.S.R. Reddy has failed to do in his lifetime, he seems to have done after his death: unite the Congress’s many factions in Andhra.
The camps have closed ranks to highlight YSR’s primary identity as a Congress leader to thwart his son Jaganmohan’s attempt to claim his father’s political legacy and outflank the party in two bypolls next month.
But the campaign has not come without contradictions. While chief minister Kiran Kumar Reddy is trying to turn the spotlight on the alleged irregularities during YSR’s regime, state Congress chief D. Srinivas has stressed that YSR belonged to the Congress and his family should not exploit his name for political gains.
The bypolls will be held in the Kadapa Lok Sabha seat which Jagan quit after walking out of the Congress. He is now seeking re-election from the same seat as a candidate of the YSR Congress, the party he floated last month.
The other bypoll is in the Pulivendula Assembly seat, which YSR represented till his death in a chopper crash in 2009. YSR’s widow Vijayalakshmi was elected from there after his death but resigned after the high command chose Kiran Kumar Reddy as chief minister following K. Rosaiah’s resignation instead of Jagan. She is now in the fray as a YSR Congress candidate.
The Telugu Desam Party is also in the race in both the seats — its main plank is to expose the alleged corruption during YSR’s regime — but it is Jagan whom the ruling party is more worried about. His group had ensured the defeat of five Congress candidates in the biannual elections to the state Legislative Council held last month. Independents supported by the breakaway leader even managed to bag three seats.
The Congress high command has decided to field YSR’s younger brother Vivekananda, a state minister now, against Vijayalakshmi. It is likely to pit K. Rajamohan Reddy, from the anti-Jagan camp, against the breakaway leader in Kadapa.
The high command had got Vivekananda inducted into the Kiran Reddy cabinet to caused a rift in YSR’s extended family and check Jagan’s onslaught. “Had the high command not stepped in, at least a two to three dozen YSR loyalists MLAs would have walked over to Jagan’s group,” said a senior minister in Kiran cabinet. Jagan is now learnt to have only 10-15 Congress MLAs loyal to him, almost half the initial number.
Ghulam Nabi Azad, the AICC leader in charge of Andhra, has been advising state leaders to project YSR as a Congress leader and refrain from negative campaigns. “You have to campaign saying YSR was a Congressman even before he became the father of Jagan,” a state leader who met Azad recently in Delhi quoted him as saying.
But Azad’s approach contrasts with chief minister Kiran Reddy’s drive to put the YSR regime’s deals under the scanner. So, while some believe the contributions of YSR are being systemically played down and even questioned by the state government, the party still hopes to ride on his reputation and image as a Congressman.
But Jagan has claimed that the fight is between YSR Congress and Sonia Gandhi, not between YSR Congress and the Congress. “We will expose how the Congress high command exploited image of YSR for its survival in Andhra and now is trying to belittle him,” Jagan said at a meeting in Vizianagaram last week.
But the tug-of-war between Jagan and the Congress has left party supporters in Kadapa, many of whom once knew no leader other than YSR, confused. “I don’t know which party I should vote —the Congress or the YSR Congress,” said Mohammed Ahmadullah, a senior worker and a long-time associate of the late chief minister.
Another party worker echoed the dilemma. “All along, YSR was Congress and Congress meant only YSR in the Kadapa district. Now how can ordinary voters understand the difference?”
But K. Jivan Reddy, in charge of the YSR Congress’s youth brigade, sounds confident. “The Congress government will try every trick to defeat Jagan but the entire constituency belongs to him and we will make sure he wins.”
-PTI