DNA Edit: Chandrababu Naidu retired hurt

The brewing storm in Andhra Pradesh reached New Delhi as the Telugu Desam Party caused a rupture in the NDA coalition by trying to bring in a no-confidence motion against the government in Parliament on Friday. TDP supremo Chandrababu Naidu – once an ardent Narendra Modi admirer – who, to a large extent, owes his political revival to the Modi wave, is changing stripes for obvious reasons.

Naidu is playing to the gallery on an emotive issue: According special status to Andhra Pradesh that comes with a host of benefits, including a generous financial package. With arch rival Jaganmohan Reddy’s YSR Congress pipping him to the post in the race to submit a notice for such a motion, Naidu couldn’t have lagged behind. After all, as the chief minister, he should be seen to be upholding the state’s interests above everything else. The TDP with just 16 members in the Lok Sabha poses no threat to the NDA’s brute majority.

The Congress trying to whip up anti-Modi sentiment by taking up Naidu and Reddy’s cause can at best create some disruptions in the House. In the numbers game, the rising clamour from a toothless Opposition should be met with plain arithmetic. Of the NDA’s 315 seats, the BJP has the maximum share of 274, which makes it comfortable enough to withstand the storm. If one factors in another grumbling ally, the Shiv Sena with its 18 MPs is too feeble to destabilise the ruling dispensation. There are doubts if the Sena will have the stomach to go solo in 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Speculations are rife that the wily Jaganmohan could be using this kerfuffle to warm up to the BJP. This could be his best shot at stymieing the TDP’s popularity a year from now. The BJP, on the other hand, will use this opportunity to gain more than a foothold in the state, where its presence is confined to two MPs and four MLAs.

However, its organisational machinery can be trusted to eat into the TDP’s support base to rock the party’s foundations. Naidu is rattled because he fears that the BJP would use its clout to destabilise his government. It shows in his harping on the Tamil Nadu flux where the saffron party is an off-stage protagonist, the key component in the power struggle. It must be said that regional outfits are under constant threat of being reduced to footnotes in history. After the Tripura loss, the CPI-M lives only in Kerala.

Trinamool Congress’s Mamata Banerjee is unnerved by the growing popularity of Right-wing ideology in West Bengal. Fearing a BJP onslaught, Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik has been trying to put his house in order. For the sake of democracy, one should welcome a hitherto moribund Opposition to kick up some fuss. Otherwise, the BJP could be perceived as autocratic. This year promises to be full of action as allies and adversaries of the NDA exchange places for a share of the power pie.