On 14 March 2023, Telugu actor turned Pawan Kalyan held a rally in coastal Andhra, from Vijayawada to Machilipatnam to commemorate his political party’s (Jana Sena Party- JSP) 10th anniversary of formation. The rally was reported to have drawn moderate to large crowds along the planned rally route.
Pawan’s fans, JSP party supporters, and the general public expected significant news/comments related to formal political alliances, a firm election strategy, a timeline for this year’s political rallies, clarity around Pawan’s political goals, focus on targeted communities, etc.
Members of the press and Telugu voters were somewhat disappointed with inadequate clarity on all things political from Pawan and his party’s leaders. First of all, there was no mention of a solid and formal pre-poll or post-poll alliance with either the BJP or the Telugu Desam Party (TDP).
Over the last three years, after Jagan Reddy’s YSRCP win in the 2019 Andhra Pradesh state elections, there have been a few well-publicised meetings and informal announcements of “collaboration” between Pawan Kalyan and the BJP or between him and the TDP supremo, N Chandrababu Naidu. All such informal joint statements had been aimed at the common goal of defeating the current YSRCP party. With about a year to go for the mid-2024 Andhra Pradesh state elections, the people of the state had been looking forward to a formally agreed upon and inked intent of fighting next year’s polls together. However, there were no major surprises or revelations announced at the March 14 anniversary celebrations that the people were hoping for.
Perhaps, it is too early to expect announcements of confirmed political announcements, election goals, and strategy?
Some observations from the Pawan Kalyan/JSP rally were:
1) His claims of being open to an alliance with both, the BJP and the TDP (not ruling out one or the other).
2) Pawan alluding to the fact that he had not yet been extended a strong, formal, satisfactory offer of electoral partnership from either party.
3) He was trying to reach out to the Muslim community – he stated that he probably lost the support of the Muslims when he hobnobbed with the BJP and clarified that the Muslim community would not be negatively impacted by his future leadership regardless of whether he aligned with the BJP or not.
He stated, “My Muslim brothers and sisters have distanced themselves from me after the alliance with BJP. If ever there is an attack on Muslims, I will quit the alliance. As long as I am with the BJP, there will be no attacks on Muslims.”
4) At this rally and meeting, there was no special outreach to the Christians, perhaps because of the strong, general perception in Andhra Pradesh that Christians had voted in unison for a fellow Christian convert, current CM Jagan Reddy of the YSRCP ruling party, during the last state elections.
5) Pawan Kalyan alluded to his uncomfortable predicament in holding joint meetings and sharing a common agenda with the state’s BJP unit because of a likely misunderstanding or miscommunication between the Central BJP leadership and the State’s BJP unit. Supporters are hoping for a possible common agenda between the two parties and a resolution of the issue soon enough, as state elections are fast approaching in about a year (Andhra Pradesh elections are scheduled to be held in the first half of 2024).
6) Pawan’s core base lies with the Backward Classes (BC) and the Other Backward Classes (OBC). He belongs to the Kapu caste, which was granted a long-standing demand for a BC status. He was careful about expressing excessive or unconditional support for the TDP, a party led by a forward-caste leader, N Chandrababu Naidu, who is Kamma Naidu/ Chowdary by caste. Yet, he made it clear that parties and politics aside, he admired and appreciated Naidu’s work and the significant progress made under Naidu’s leadership both in the undivided Andhra Pradesh state (before its division into Andhra and Telangana) as well as in the new, residual state of Andhra Pradesh.
7) Pawan Kalyan had some sharp words of criticism for Jagan Reddy’s openly casteist politics and emphatically stated that people should come together regardless of caste identity for the future of the state, ruined by Jagan Reddy’s casteist politics, corruption scandals, and irresponsible financial debts. He promised a fair and just caste representation if voted to power.
8) Responding to a challenge by the ruling YSRCP party to contest all 175 Assembly seats in the next election, the JSP party founder said that his party’s target is to win a majority of the seats in the Andhra Pradesh Assembly and soundly defeat the YSRCP!
From the tone and tenor of Pawan Kalyan’s meeting, political analysts have surmised that Pawan is likely looking for an alliance with the BJP or the TDP, albeit one that is satisfactory for him and his party, in terms of the number of seats offered in partnership, some plum post-poll postings, sharing of resources, etc.
The BJP hasn’t made any significant promises yet, and it continues to have an informal understanding of sorts with Jagan Reddy’s ruling YSRCP party while Pawan and Reddy are open and obvious political foes with both parties often taunting and challenging each other in the public domain.
The TDP is currently playing it cautiously because of caste formulations and sensitivities (some of the other BC communities are wary of Pawan’s caste), because they’re aiming to win back votes from his community with their own effort and also because it is widely believed that it was Pawan’s party that split the traditional BC/OBC vote share of the TDP, ultimately giving the new YSRCP party an electoral advantage with their calculation of a unified SC, ST, and minorities vote, back in the 2019 state elections.
What does Pawan’s political future look like? Will each of the major contenders in Andhra Pradesh politics (TDP, JSP, BJP, YSRCP) go it alone or stitch up alliances, either pre-poll or post-poll? In the meanwhile, the neighbouring Telugu state of Telangana is a potboiler right now, ahead of this year’s state elections in a triangular face-off – the ruling Bharat Rashtra Samithi party (BRS) and a fast-gaining BJP are competing for the top post with the TDP, the Congress, the YSRTP and others trailing behind.
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