'Will Shut Shop, If TDP Loses', Chandrababu Naidu

What the political pundits have been predicting about the main Opposition all these years, have been confirmed by none other than party president N Chandrababu Naidu himself. According to media reports, Naidu is understood to have told the party functionaries that he may have to bring down the shutters if the Telugu Desam failed to win the next elections.

Any setback for the party means it will be relegated to the status of Communist parties with either the YSR Congress or the Congress taking its place in the state.

Naidu may have turned philosophical after the battering the party received in all elections held during the last three years, desertion of party leaders including MLAs and the dissent from the Nandamuri family members for his decision to showcase his son Nara Lokesh Naidu.

Victories and losses are part of the game for any political party but it is viewed as a question of life and death for a regional party like Telugu Desam in the state.

There will be more desertions and the demand for the scalp of the party president will become shriller and louder in the coming years.

DMK was out of power for 15 years, from 1974 till 1989, while the Congress has to be content by remaining in the opposition in Gujarat for the last two decades.

Even Telugu Desam’s founder president N T Rama Rao suffered humiliating defeat in 1989 after winning the elections twice – in 1983 and 1985.

Still, the charismatic leader bounced back by winning 219 seats in the 1994 elections and the Congress even failed to get the main opposition status as it could not even secure 10 per cent of seats in 294 seats in the Assembly.

But Chandrababu Naidu neither has the charisma of his predecessor Rama Rao nor the confidence to regain power in the state.

This is the reason why he has been making all sorts of promises to all sections knowing pretty well that it needs the budget of all southern states put together to implement his assurances.