Aruna Ravikumar
The political landscape in Andhra Pradesh in the run up to the polls for the State assembly and Lok Sabha elections remains unique in the country with women leading the two national parties in the fray. As political diatribe gets shriller and surveys get murkier, Daggubati Purandeswari the state BJP chief and Y.S. Sharmila Reddy, Jagan Mohan Reddy’s sister and President of the Congress party, are helming their parties and hope to impact a large cross-section of voters particularly women.
There is no dearth of women spokespersons in the different political parties particularly among the main contenders, the ruling YSR Congress party and the Telugu Desam party who have been pouring vitriol even as the campaign gets intense and adds heat to the already rising temperatures. The impact these women leaders have on the electoral result in the triangular contest between the Congress party, the YSR Congress party and the Telugu Desam-BJP- Jana sena alliance in the state, remains a subject of speculation in the state.
Inheritors of a legacy
While Sharmila, daughter of former Chief minister Y.S. Rajashekhar Reddy is a claimant to her father and popular former Chief Minister Y.S. Rajashekar Reddy’s political legacy, Purandeswari as daughter of legendary film actor and former Chief minister N. T. Rama Rao is similarly placed. YSR’s son Y.S.Jaganmohan Reddy as we know assumed the mantle of leadership invoking his father’s legacy after being denied the same by Sonia Gandhi. Sharmila who undertook an extensive padayatra during her brother’s jail term has come out against him for having denied her the position that she felt she rightly deserved after he became Chief minister.
Fighting her brother on the issue of corruption, nepotism and unfulfilled promises she has multaneously launched a no-holds barred campaign against her cousin Y.S. Avinash Reddy, her opponent in the Kadapa parliamentary constituency for the Lok Sabha polls.
Her explosive speeches are filled with anger against Avinash who she points out is an accused in the killing of her uncle and Y.S. Rajashekar Reddy’s brother Y. S. Vivekananda Reddy.
Purandeswari’s own equation with her brother-in-law and TDP supremo Chandrababu Naidu has been blow hot, blow cold through the tumultuous political developments in the state but she is now back in alliance with him as the state chief of the saffron party. Purandeswari is contesting the Lok Sabha polls from the Rajamahendravaram against YSRCP’s Bharat Margani who has ridiculed her as one who isn’t even aware of the borders of the constituency to which she is alien.
Although she has been taking barbs at Jagan Reddy her speeches are more muted in comparison to Sharmila’s.
Will they make any impact?
While BJP has been banking on tie-ups with regional parties in states where they don’t have influence on their own for a while, the Congress party wants to do the same thing with Sharmila. Both women are good orators and have been speaking their mind out but that is all they may be able to do. Sharmila speaking up against her brother is definitely an embarrassment but will it fetch votes? If the Congress that has lost all credibility in Andhra Pradesh after partition of the Telugu states does find its feet, whose votes will it cut into?
The YSRCP or the TDP? While Sharmila is seen as a leader who failed in Telangana, Purandeswari has no great mass appeal. They have to win their own seats and have bravely taken on the reins of their parties doing their bit to positively impact the results. As they say, even posturing has value in politics where nothing is impossible and most results unpredictable.
