The Bharatiya Janata Party appears to have decided to remain content with playing second fiddle to the Telugu Desam Party in Andhra Pradesh and be its tail piece, rather than growing into an independent and alternative political force in the state.
It was evident from the way the BJP national leaders have been competing with one another in singing paens for TDP president and chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu.
While BJP national president Amit Shah is understood to have told the party leaders from AP not to get into confrontation with Naidu and not to admit any TDP leaders into the party, one union minister after the other has started showering praises on Naidu.
The latest example is Unoin Energy Minister Piyush Goel, who declared that he had never seen any chief minster as dynamic and hyperactive as Chandrababu Naidu.
He went on to declare that Naidu was a task master and would not sleep till he gets the best for the state. This was really embarrassing to local BJP leaders like Somu Veerraju, who have been going hammer and tongs against the corruption in Naidu regime.
Earlier, other union ministers like Nirmala Sitaraman, Smriti Irani, Nitin Gadkari and J P Nadda and of course, Venkaiah Naidu had come to Andhra Pradesh and showered encomiums on the dynamism of Naidu. If that is the stand taken by the central BJP leadership, what can the BJP leaders back home like Kavuri Sambasiva Rao, Daggubati Purandeshwari and Kanna Lakshminarayana do?
It is better they look for alternative political platforms at the earliest!
