Telugu Desam faces anti-incumbency

Hyderabad: Can Telugu Desam chief N. Chandrababu Naidu’s personal charisma overcome the anti-incumbency factor so that he retains power in Andhra Pradesh as his counterpart, Telangana state Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao did?

The million-dollar question has been haunting not only the Telugu Desam leadership, but also the people of Andhra Pradesh. Voters are angry at several sitting MLAs who have got party tickets to contest the forthcoming elections. But, then, the same was the case in TS, where the Telangana Rashtra Samiti chief had given tickets to sitting MLAs in the December 2018 Assembly elections, and won a landslide victory because of his personal charisma.

Privately, TD leaders admit that the formula which has worked well in the case of Mr Rao in Telangana may not work in AP as the situation in the TD is not like that in the TRS.

Sources close to the TD revealed that the party leadership is worried at the results of an internal survey conducted by the party, in which a majority of those surveyed were soft towards Mr Naidu, but were not so keen on voting in favour of the sitting MLAs.

Sources said that many people surveyed wanted to vote for Mr Naidu, but were put off by the fact that they would then have to put up with the sitting MLA for another five years.

Sources said though earlier surveys carried out by the party before allocating tickets also indicated that people were angry at the sitting MLAs and some of the ministers, the party chief was confident that people will vote for him and not for the local  candidate.

Surveys conducted after the finalisation of the list of candidates, however, have given results contrary to the opinion of the party chief. Sources pointed out that the more worrying factor for the party leadership is that some people during the survey said that they will vote for the sitting MLAs, despite their anger, for the sake of Mr Naidu, but were apprehensive that the Chief Minister will not take action against the MLAs concerned.

Even some party leaders privately admit that on earlier occasions when some MLAs and ministers brought to the notice of the Chief Minister the anti-people activities of their colleagues, there was no proper response from the party chief.