How the Andhra Roller Coaster has hammered YSR

By: Sutanu Guru

In the run up to the 2024 elections, a large majority of analysts and pundits were of the opinion that while the TDP led three party alliance would win the elections, the YSR Congress too would do well. After all, as chief minister, Jagan Mohan had unleashed a slew of welfare schemes that were very popular.

For more than two decades, two families have been at each others throats and fighting a no holds barred battle for supremacy. In 2004, it was the father Y. S. R. Rajasekhara Reddy of the Congress who humbled the then Andhra Pradesh chief minister and the media favourite N. Chandrababu Naidu of the TDP. Since then, he and his son Y. S. R. Jagan Mohan Reddy have usually held the upper hand against Naidu, even in defeat. YSR died in a helicopter crash in 2009 after winning a second successive mandate and his son Jagan Mohan revolted against the Congress and formed his own regional party YSR Congress in 2011.

Yet, after dominating Andhra politics for two decades, the Reddy family has been dealt a hammer blow in the 2024 assembly elections. Barring Just look at the roller coaster nature of the chart that shows the number of seats won by the two principal rivals since the 2009 assembly elections. Barring a narrow loss in 2014, the Reddy family has been the dominant force in Andhra since 2004. When Jagan Mohan was part of the Congress, his father led the party to two massive victories in 2004 and 2009. By 2014, the Congress had virtually disappeared from the political map of Andhra as the carving out of a separate state Telangana had ignited the fury of Andhra voters. But Jagan Mohan stood his ground and his regional party YSR Congress did reasonably well despite a strong TDP-BJP alliance. As the chart shows, the YSR won 67 of the 175 and the TDP had won 102. In the 2019 assembly elections, the Jagan juggernaut decimated the TDP, reducing it to a mere 23 seats.

Surprisingly, in the run up to the 2024 elections, a large majority of analysts and pundits were of the opinion that while the TDP led three party alliance would win the elections, the YSR Congress too would do well. After all, as chief minister, Jagan Mohan had unleashed a slew of welfare schemes that were very popular, particularly among female voters. But the results came as a shock to both pundits and personally to Jagan Mohan Reddy who had started acquiring an aura of being invincible. The YSR seat tally has plummeted from 151 to just 21 while the TDP tally has skyrocketed from 23 to 135. A classic roller coaster. Of course, the TDP alliance with the BJP and the Jan Sena of Pawan Kalyan did help, but winning 135 out of 175 seats on it’s a own is a milestone for Chandra Babu Naidu.

What triggered such a massive loss for Jagan Mohan Reddy. In purely data terms, it is all about changing vote shares. In the 2019 assembly elections, the YSR Congress had nearly touched 50% while rival TDP could manage 39%. The 11% vote share lead was enough to result in a landslide. The tables turned in 2024. The YSR Congress crashed by more than 10% to about 39% while the TDP vote share spiked to 45.6%. The vote share of the NDA alliance as a whole was nearly 54%. No surprise then that the 15% vote share lead resulted in a landslide for the TDP & NDA. As for reasons, it is best left for political scientists to debate though many analysts point out that the manner in which Jagan Mohan got Chandra Babu Naidu arrested and jailed angered the voters.

Beyond the Andhra numbers resides another intriguing trend. What is happening to regional parties? Some, like DMK, TMC, SP and RJD remain formidable while others like AIDMK, JD(S), BJD, AGP and SAD face an uncertain future, if not slow death. Look at Telangana. After ruling the state for 10 years the BRS has been virtually wiped.

In a future piece, we will use data to analyse the wildly contrasting performance of regional parties.