In Andhra Pradesh, It’s Sharmila Vs Sibling Jagan Mohan

The newly-appointed Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) President Y. S. Sharmila has directly challenged her brother, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and Y. S. Jagan Mohan Reddy in his bid to appropriate their father Y. S. Rajashekhar Reddy’s political legacy. Jagan is also the president of the Yuvajana Sramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP) that he founded.

Sharmila's return to the Congress-fold has come as a shot-in-the-arm for the beleaguered party in Andhra Pradesh. Along with the loss of Y.S.R’s Legacy, the party lost several of its top-level leaders, cadres and vote bank to the YSRCP.

Sharmila’s tasks are clear. She has to not only reclaim Y.S.R’s political legacy, but also win over the leaders, cadres, and the Congress vote bank, in Andhra Pradesh.

In the upcoming simultaneous Andhra Pradesh Assembly and Lok Sabha elections, Sharmila is expected to knock out Jagan’s claim to Y.S.R’s legacy, which supporters say rightly belongs to the Congress, as the late Y.S.R. lived and died as a Congressman.

Sharmila struck at Jagan’s Achilles heel, when she pointed out how the Y.S.R. was a quintessential Congressman, and remained anti-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) all his life.

He had campaigned for establishing ‘Indiramma Rajyam’, or ushering in a Indira Gandhi inspired governance in the State, and his dream was to work towards making Rahul Gandhi the Prime Minister of India.

On all the three counts, Jagan does not measure up Y.S.R. It is on this ground that Sharmila is questioning Jagan’s claim to Y.S.R’s legacy

Eversince Jagan became residuary Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister in 2019, he has been vying with his political bete-noire, the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) supremo N. Chandrababu Naidu, to be on the BJP’s ‘right side’.

Outgoing APCC President Gidugu Rudra Raju is credited with coining a new acronym, BJP, which stands for ‘Babu-Jagan-Pawan’.

Political rivals, Jagan and Naidu, are vying with each other to get closer to the BJP. Neither misses a chance to prove their loyalty to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. All 25 MPs from Andhra Pradesh, including 22 YSRCP MPs and three TDP MPs, have rallied behind Prime Minister Naremdra Modi.

While the YSRCP and TDP-Jana Sena combine stand alongside the BJP, the Congress has emerged for the first time as the only alternative pole, thanks to Sharmila.

The TDP Supremo N. Chandrababu Naidu is keen on returning to the BJP-fold, Jagan is positioning himself to stay on the right side of the BJP.

There was never a single occasion when Jagan ever opposed the BJP. In the run-up to the elections in 2019, Jagan appealed to the people to elect YSRCP candidates as MPs in large numbers, to enable him to compel the BJP Government at the Centre to confer the Special Category Status on Andhra Pradesh.

After storming to power, winning 151 out of 175 MLAs and 22 out of 25 MPs, Jagan never articulated the demand for Special Category Status, nor did he make any move to compel the BJP to confer the Special Category Status on Andhra Pradesh.

The BJP has made it clear in the 10 years that it has been in office at the Centre, that it is against implementation of the Bifurcation Package for Andhra Pradesh.

The Congress had promised Special Category Status for Andhra Pradesh; a Bundelkhand-type Package for North-Coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema districts; Fiscal incentives to promote industrialisation in the State; Railway Zone in Visakhapatnam; and setting up a Steel Plant in Rayalaseema.

The Congress has also committed itself to safeguard the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant, which the Modi Government has decided to privatise.

Even during Y.S.R's lifetime, Jagan was seen working openly with the BJP leaders, popularly known as Ballari Brothers in Karnataka, led by Gali Janardhan Reddy.

The then undivided Andhra Pradesh’s CM Y.S.R’s ill-fated helicopter went missing on September 2, 2009. At a crucial time when efforts were mounted to trace the deceased leander’s body and bring it to Hyderabad, Jagan opened a register to collect signatures of the ruling Congress MLAs in the then undivided Andhra Pradesh Capital, reportedly unmindful of the tragedy that had struck his family, the ruling Congress and the people of the state.

The unsuspecting MLAs reportedly signed in the register, under the impression that it was meant for recording condolences to the late Congress leader. But Jagan had other plans. He collected the signatures as a show of strength for his claim to succeed YSR as the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister.

Departing from the norm that three SPG protectees cannot travel together, the then Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh, then Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Congress MP Rahul Gandhi rushed to Hyderabad in the same flight, on hearing the tragic news of YSR's death.

They reached YSR's residence in Hyderabad to convey their condolences and to assure their unstinted support to the bereaved family. But Jagan was in no mood to budge from his demand to succeed his late father and be instantly made the Chief Minister,

The Congress could not have trusted stewardship of a major state in the hands of a political greenhorn. It had been only three months since he had joined the Congress to become a Member of Parliament on the party ticket.

Instead, Jagan was offered a Ministerial berth at the Centre, as he was then a sitting MP. But he rejected it, adamant on his demand for Chief Ministership.

The upcoming simultaneous elections to Andhra Pradesh Assembly and Lok Sabha elections promises a serious contest, with two rival political viewpoints. For the first time in 10 years in the residuary state of Andhra Pradesh, the Congress has emerged as a rival pole to the YSRCP and the TDP-Jana Sena.

In her public rallies, Sharmila points out that whether the people vote for YSRCP, or TDP-Jana Sena Combine, or the BJP, it all goes to the credit of one person and that is Prime Minister Narendra Modi. For a political alternative, the people will have to vote for the Congress.