On a sunny day this summer, while YS Bharathi Reddy, wife of outgoing Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, was on a campaign trail in Pulivendula, their home turf, for her husband, an elderly farmer threw at her a series of questions. “He harps on ‘My SC…My ST…My BC…My Minorities’. Did he ever say, ‘My farmers?’” was one of them. (SC for Scheduled Castes, ST for Scheduled Tribes, BC for Backward Classes, Minorities for Christians and Muslims). This question, seen in conjunction with the other question the farmer asked about the newly enacted ‘Land Titling Act,’ points toward the deafening rout the YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) faced in the 2024 Assembly elections in the state.
YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, KS Jawahar Reddy, KV Rajendranadh Reddy, S Ramakrishna Reddy. They are the outgoing Chief Minister (CM), Chief Secretary (CS), Director General of Police (DGP), and Principal Advisor to the Government, respectively. One can hazard a guess about their caste and most probably would get it right. Never has in the history of Andhra Pradesh – united or bifurcated – and most probably in the country, the CM, CS, DGP, and the second most powerful person in the party and government hailed from the same caste and district. All are from the Reddy caste from YSR Kadapa district, named after Jagan’s father and former CM late YS Rajasekhara Reddy. This is another lens through which one can attempt to understand the historic drubbing YSRCP received. However, in a tragic irony for the party, the same section spelled doom for them.
The results of the elections to the Assembly and Lok Sabha in Andhra Pradesh stumped everyone on both sides of the aisle and those sitting on the aisle. Telugu Desam Party (TDP), contesting in alliance with Jana Sena Party (JSP) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), won 135 of the 144 assembly seats it contested. JSP won 21 out of 21 and BJP 8 out of 10. Similarly, while TDP won 16 of the 17 MP seats it contested, JSP won 2 out of 2 and BJP 3 out of 6. Never did Andhra Pradesh witness such one-sided results since Independence. Not even in 1983, when the new TDP swept the state, not in 1994, when NT Rama Rao (NTR) made a spectacular comeback, and not even in 2019 when YSRCP had a landslide victory. What is it that led to what appears to be such a committed voting by the people of the state?
When the new state of Andhra Pradesh was formed in 2014, it desperately needed solid financial resources and a blueprint to develop them. TDP, which romped home to power that year, cobbled together whatever it could to build the dream capital named Amaravati and also for the welfare schemes and employment-generating developmental works it had promised. It was also a comeback for Kammas, the backbone caste of TDP. However, failure in developing resources, excessive focus on Amaravati, neglect of particularly BC castes - their significant support base - and overbearing Kamma presence led to their demise in 2019 when Jagan was elected with a thumping majority.
Jagan rose to power on the promises of expanded welfare, increased political representation for marginalised castes, and the development of backward regions of the state. Jagan had the overwhelming support of Reddys, Dalits, Adivasis, many BCs, Muslims, and a sizable section of the Kapu caste. The triangular fight between TDP, YSRCP, and Jana Sena played its part. However, the situation reversed in 2024. TDP, in alliance with JSP, secured a majority of Reddy, BC, Muslim, and Kapu votes, with a sizable section of Dalits and Adivasis moving away from YSRCP. BJP rode on the back of these two parties and benefitted handsomely. Despite being in an alliance with the BJP, the support among Muslims is noteworthy. While it is understood that there are 20 constituencies where Muslim votes are majority or decisive, the alliance won all the seats, with BJP winning 2 of them.
Jagan’s promise of expanded welfare started with a bang and ended with a whimper. The Jagan style of welfare governance was limited to targeted Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) schemes to the beneficiaries. The government’s investment in what is understood to be classical welfare, such as education, health, infrastructure, and public sector employment generation, was dismal, to say the least. The various corporations for SC, ST, and BC castes, along with dominant castes, that have been vehicles for political and economic mobility were hollowed out by withholding funds and powers. The welfare schemes for marginalised sections were put on hold, and the money intended for them was diverted to DBT schemes, thereby rendering the welfare toothless.
Take the example of financial support for students from SC castes intending to study abroad. Apart from Jagan renaming the scheme after himself, replacing Ambedkar's name from it, the number of hoops one has to jump through to avail of the scholarship made it practically impossible. The situation with other welfare schemes was no different. An ingenious budget accounting technique was developed to create the illusion of enormous spending for the welfare of SC/ST castes by replacing the SC/ST Sub-Plan, which mandates proportionate allocation of budgetary resources. Whereas SC/ST Sub-Plan has mandated spending, this disbursal is personalised and whimsical, replacing rights with favours that did not go down well with these sections. Many such welfare schemes were scrapped, affecting these sections materially and politically. The case with Muslims is no different.
Be that as it may. While Jagan’s government started with 50 percent reservation for SC/ST/BC/Minority castes in the nominated posts and even implemented it, the visible power holders calling the shots were from the Reddy caste. The hollowing out of caste corporations with scope for power and the power in nominated posts being nominal did not go unnoticed. After all, a democratic churning is as much about a pie of power as much about dignity. Similar is the case with political power. While half of the state cabinet was filled with representatives from the aforementioned sections, it has been widely understood that the real power was held by S Ramakrishna Reddy, without whose consent even an inconsequential file could not move in the power corridors. The situation was not much different in other avenues of power, which only exacerbated the anger.
Though one need not conform to the neoliberal binary of welfare and development, sustainable development as an employment-generating activity cannot be ignored, particularly in a state like Andhra Pradesh, which has fewer manufacturing jobs to begin with. That kind of development was severely lacking, with fiscal constraints further abetted by humongous debt the state amassed (according to one estimate, around 10 lakh crore) to fuel the DBT machine. To be fair to Jagan, one cannot blame him alone for the lack of private employment, as the situation is dire across the country. However, the lack of public employment added fuel to the fire. It was seen as unpardonable in a highly aspirational society whose world revolves around migrating to greener pastures in the West.
While the state is found wanting in industrial development, ill-conceived, quid-pro-quo policies such as sand mining and supposed three capitals severely debilitated the construction sector. None of these policies are either well thought out or consulted with. The large-scale migration to cities within Andhra and without, such as Hyderabad and Bengaluru, is a testimony to this.
While the manufacturing economy was in a shambles, the utter neglect of irrigation, especially in the Rayalaseema region, further accentuated the agrarian distress. With hardly any investment in developing surface irrigation for dry regions, they are left to fend for themselves or migrate as labourers to work in more prosperous agrarian belts in Coastal Andhra and Karnataka. The promise of developing backward areas is the promise of irrigation and industries to North Coastal Andhra and Rayalseema. Jagan’s government spectacularly failed on these two fronts.
While the situation concerning the economy and agriculture is dismal, the ill-thought, hasty enactment of the ‘Land Titling Act’ without consultation completed the decimation. The legislation, dubbed the ‘Land Grabbing Act’ by the Opposition, and was opposed from the beginning by organisations such as the Human Rights Forum (HRF), aimed to replace the existing process of registration of lands and dispute resolution mechanism. While the existing framework places the dispute resolution within the ambit of the judiciary, the legislation moved it to bureaucracy, thereby compromising the mechanism's independence.
That this would disproportionately affect the BC, SC, ST, and weaker sections did not deter Jagan’s government from going forward with its rollout till the judiciary stepped in and halted it. Helped liberally by scoops from the Telugu media sympathetic to TDP, the opposition successfully took the disastrous consequences of this Act widely and deeply into the rural populace. The fact that every document, survey stone, and all sundry bore the image of Jagan Mohan Reddy did not exactly help them in countering it. This legislation was the final act to bring down the curtain on Jagan’s rule.
While the election result was a surprise for most, the fact that most exit polls, despite predicting a majority for the TDP alliance, could not gauge the extent of it itself tells a tale of political democracy and its valuable cousin, freedom of expression, or fear of expression, as was the case.
Any criticism, personal or political, was dealt with by hammers and tongs. Starting from an elderly woman who was harassed by the police for sharing a critical post on social media to Nara Lokesh, who was slapped with at least 23 cases in these 5 years, none could escape the possibility of being attacked for their opinion. According to one estimate, the cadre and leaders of the TDP were named as accused in around 2400 cases. While it is understood that the State has a monopoly on violence, political violence is decentralised and personalised.
The killing of members from oppositional parties, mostly from marginalised sections, attacking them verbally and physically, and continuous abuse on all media platforms, including virulent social media, did not go unnoticed. As if it was enough, Jagan was seen openly backing elected representatives from his party accused of murdering Dalits. Similarly, the lack of concrete action in cases of mortal police brutality against Dalit professionals while advertising himself as the uncle of Dalits was not forgotten.
The amount of abuse the protesting farmers and women of Amaravati had to endure is a case in point. It went to the extent that the wife of Nara Chandrababu Naidu - who was a businesswoman unconnected to politics as such - was abused on the floor of the Assembly by YSRCP MLAs, with tacit support from the Chief Minister. So was the case when the headquarters of the TDP was attacked by a mob led by Ministers and MLAs of the ruling party.
Geographically and politically, regions such as Palnadu and Rayalaseema were heavily affected by such violence. In these regions, the YSRCP—which had always been strong—was entirely routed in the elections. A clean correlation could be a stretch, but the possibility cannot be ruled out.
It did not help that the village/ward volunteer system, in which a volunteer working on behalf of the government was paid a paltry honorarium of Rs 5000/month to act as a liaison between the government and 50 families, was seen as an extension of the State into everyday life. While the system is a radical means of democratising governance, the privacy nightmare it ensured did all the damage it could. The same system also did not sit well with the village-level leaders, who felt their relationship with people as voters was bypassed.
While Jagan’s government was faltering on multiple fronts, the solid alliance built between TDP and JSP after the arrest of Chandrababu Naidu for his alleged role in the alleged skill development scam was coming to fruition. The promises of enhancing the DBT aid coupled with restoring the scrapped welfare schemes, scrapping of the Land Titling Act, the promise of public employment and private employment generation, along with deft caste alliances sealed the defeat of YSRCP.
Views expressed are the author’s own.
Gutta Rohith is a human rights activist and the Andhra Pradesh state secretary of Human Rights Forum.