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NAIDU
IN A SPOT
The
Aaj Tak-Dainik Bhaskar-India Today-ORG MARG poll suggests that ironically
it is his home region of Rayalseema that has turned against the Andhra
Pradesh chief minister. India Today's AJIT KUMAR
JHA explains why.
Once projected
as the model chief minister, N. Chandrababu Naidu appears to be in serious
trouble today. If the most exhaustive opinion poll jointly commissioned
by Aaj Tak-Dainik Bhaskar-India Today and conducted by ORG-MARG is to
be believed, the Telugu Desam party under Naidu faces a virulent voters'
ire. The voters anger across Andhra Pradesh, the survey suggests, measure
up to a strong negative swing in the Lok Sabha polls against the Telugu
Desam Party of nearly - 7 per cent. The anti-incumbency wave is so strong
that the TDP-BJP alliance which swept the state in the Lok Sabha elections
of 1999 winning 36 seats out of 42 is likely to be reduced to 19 seats-a
massive loss of 17 seats.
A region-wise break up within Andhra Pradesh throws some surprising results.
The general impression is that the TDP is hurting in the Telangana region
where the movement for a separate Telangana state backed by the Telangana
Regional Samithi and Congress alliance is playing havoc with Naidu's future.
But the survey data suggests that the maximum negative swing against the
TDP is actually in the Rayalseema region where Naidu hails from.
The TDP, the survey suggests, faces a negative - 7.01 (minus 7.01) swing
in the Reddy caste-dominated Rayalseema region. This is particularly acute
in the rural areas of Rayalseema which is suffering from one of the worst
droughts in recent memory. The agitating farmers of Rayalseema are up
in arms against Naidu whom they perceive as a head of state ansd is considered
elitist in his approach towards development. Although the TDP faces a
negative swing in Telangana, the magnitude of the swing is much less at
-0.19 per cent. Similarly, in the coastal Andhra region, the TDP faces
a negative swing of -1.7 per cent.
The BJP, the much smaller alliance partner in Andhra Pradesh is actually
helping the TDP reduce some of that anti-incumbency. The BJP witnesses
a positive swing in both coastal Andhra (0.34 per cent) as well as the
Rayalaseema region (0.01 per cent). It is only in the Telangana region
where the BJP faces a negative swing of -3.82 per cent.
It is precisely because of this anti-incumbency against Naidu that the
Congress is surging ahead in Andhra Pradesh, particularly in Rayalseema
and the coastal regions where the positive swing for it is as high as
7 per cent and 1.97 per cent. In fact, it is ironically in Telangana where
the Congress faces a negative swing of - 0.62 per cent. In fact, the negative
swing faced by all three political parties - the TDP, the BJP and the
Congress - in the Telangana region is because of the formation of the
TRS which is cutting away into their votes in 6 parliamentary constituencies.
The growing strength of the TRS is bound to help the Congress since it
is the TRS's poll partner. As the cliche goes, one ma's loss is another
man's gain.
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