From Rajasekhara Reddy to Chandrababu Naidu to Jagan Mohan, the man who led the yatra became chief minister.
Published Sep 20, 2022 | 2:40 PM ⚊ Updated Sep 20, 2022 | 5:38 PM
Jana Sena chief Pawan Kalyan and TDP general secretary & ex minister Nara Lokesh (Supplied)
Come January, it will be yatra time for TDP general secretary and former minister Nara Lokesh and Jana Sena chief Pawan Kalyan. Their respective yatras are expected to raise the political heat in Andhra Pradesh in the run-up to the 2024 state and general elections.
While Lokesh is expected to embark on a padayatra, Pawan Kalyan would tour the state in a bus.
Though both Lokesh and Pawan Kalyan were supposed to launch their respective yatras in October, the programmes have now been postponed to January.
Initially, Lokesh was to set off on his padayatra on 2 October — Gandhi Jayanti — the same day his father and former chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu had launched his padayatra in 2012 from Hindupur.
Interestingly, it is learnt the two leaders intend to launch their respective yatras from Chittoor. While Pawan Kalyan will embark on his bus yatra from the temple town of Tirupati, it is not yet known from which part of Chittoor Lokesh will set off on his padayatra.
TDP insiders said it is most likely to be from the family bastion of Kuppam, Chandrababu Naidu’s constituency.
“Initially Lokesh was to launch the padayatra in October, but the party decided it would fetch better returns if launched in January. It would help build momentum one-and-a-half years before the polls scheduled in May 2024,” a TDP leader told South First.
TDP insiders said that Lokesh will walk for at least 450 days and the route map is being finalised.
The padayatra is expected to help Lokesh emerge as the undisputed leader in the TDP as, apart from meeting the general public, he will be interacting with party cadres across the state and fixing issues, if any, among local leaders.
Jana Sena supremo Pawan Kalyan was to embark on his state-wide tour from the temple town Tirupati on Dasara that falls on 5 October this year.
The party’s Political Affairs Committee Chairman Nadendla Manohar said the tour is planned in such a way that Pawan will cover every Assembly segment in six months, with public meetings in every district.
With one exception, whoever has undertaken a padayatra in recent times in Andhra Pradesh has gone on to win the next elections and become chief minister.
In the Telugu states and in recent times, Jagan Mohan’s father YS Rajasekhara Reddy was the first politician to embark on a padayatra to revive the fortunes of the Congress party after it suffered a huge defeat to Chandrababu Naidu’s TDP in 1999.
YS Jagan Mohan Reddy during his famous Praja Sankalpa Yatra. (Supplied)
To rejuvenate the party, Rajasekhara Reddy undertook a 1,475-km walkathon across the united Andhra Pradesh and eventually brought the party back into power in 2004. The film Yatra starring Malayalam star Mammootty was based on Reddy’s padayatra.
Similarly, in a bid to resurrect the fortunes of the TDP, Naidu embarked on a 2,800-km padayatra across the length and breadth of Andhra Pradesh in 2012. Naidu won the 2014 election and became the chief minister of divided Andhra Pradesh.
Jagan Mohan too followed in the footsteps of his father and embarked on his Praja Sankalpa Yatra in 2017, covering 3,648 km — said to be the longest padayatra by any politician. Eventually, he registered a landslide victory in 2019, despite the strong Narendra Modi wave sweeping across the country.
Apart from being a mass-contact programme, the padayatra helped Jagan Mohan sort out differences among party leaders wherever he went, which eventually helped the electioneering of the party. Leaders put aside differences and worked with the sole aim of making Jagan Mohan the chief minister.
The only exception to the successful padayatra rule is that of Jagan Mohan’s sister Sharmila.
She had taken up the party mantle when her brother was in jail and had also walked across the length and breadth of the state. However, in the polls that followed in 2014, the YSRCP could not come to power.
Political observers now await the fate of the two latest politicians embarking on a yatra.
