It was a year of dramatic reversal of political fortunes, natural disasters, broken promises and controversies for Andhra Pradesh in 2024 and the upcoming year 2025 is expected to throw up big challenges for the ruling Telugu Desam Party led by chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu.
For Naidu, 2024 was a big year as he staged a comeback to power from a near-impossible situation, after going through the most turbulent period of his life in the last few months of the previous year.
Having been in prison for 53 days, Naidu rose like a phoenix and decimated the then ruling YSR Congress party led by Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy.
Thanks to the initiative taken by Jana Sena Party chief Pawan Kalyan to prevent the split of anti-incumbency vote, the Bharatiya Janata Party joined hands with the TDP, which helped Naidu to ascend the throne as the chief minister for the fourth time.
As the election fever began gripping the state as early as January 2024, Jagan continued to make strategic mistakes – banking solely on his welfare schemes and ignoring the development agenda in his electioneering.
The reshuffle of constituencies of several MLAs and MPs, denial of tickets to many sitting MLAs and ignoring the ground realities led to his party’s debacle in the elections.
Added to this, the negative campaign against him by his own sister Y S Sharmila, who took over as the Congress chief by then, made things worse for Jagan.
The elections concluded with a high voter turnout of 81.86%. Post-election violence erupted in a few districts, particularly in Palnadu, Anantapur and Tirupati.
The TDP-led National Democratic Alliance swept the election, securing 164 assembly and 21 Lok Sabha seats. While the TDP won 135 assembly seats, the Jana Sena Party had a 100 percent strike rate by winning 21 assembly and two Lok Sabha seats.
The BJP secured eight assembly seats, while the YSRCP ended up with just 11 assembly seats, and Jagan’s “Why Not 175?” slogan turned a far cry.
Naidu began on a strong note by substantially enhancing the pension as promised before the elections. He withdrew Land Titling Act, revived Anna Canteens and fulfilled the promise of supplying three free gas cylinders a year for the poor women.
Though Naidu promised to conduct a mega DSC and take up the country’s first skill census, they haven’t taken off yet even after six months.
There were other broken promises like providing the free bus travel scheme for women, payment of Rs 20,000 each farmer under Annadata Sukhibhava scheme, payment of Rs 15,000 to each woman under Thalliki Vandanam scheme, Rs 1500 to each poor woman under Adabidda Nidhi scheme and unemployment allowance of Rs 3,000 to each jobless youth etc.
In September, the State government faced its biggest challenge when unprecedented rains, unseen in nearly 50 years, battered Vijayawada, Mangalagiri, and Guntur.
As the rains subsided, citizens were in for a rude shock, waking up to flooded streets in parts of the city. Nearly seven lakh people were affected by the deluge, which followed the breach of the Budameru Rivulet.
Many residents were stranded in their homes, without power, water or food. There was panic in another part of the city as well as the Prakasam Barrage received record inflows. The devastating floods claimed at least 35 lives.
Chandrababu Naidu won the hearts of the people by personally supervising relief operations by being in the field for more than 10 days. The Indian Army joined the government in efforts to plug the breach in the Budameru Rivulet & prevent further damage.
AMARAVATI AND POLAVARAM
Naidu has taken full advantage of the TDP being part of the NDA both in the state and the Centre. He revived the Amaravati capital city project, which was dumped by the previous Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy government, and the Centre quickly came to his support by arranging massive financial assistance from the World Bank, ADB and other institutions.
The works on Amaravati capital city project are going on in full swing and as the year comes to a close, the World Bank and the ADB announced releasing of soft loans for the project.
The tenders have been called for taking up of works at a brisk pace, with Naidu fixing a three-year target for constructing the capital city.
Thirteen international and central institutions have expressed interest in establishing campuses in Amaravati.
Among them are NALSAR (National Academy of Legal Studies and Research) University, Premier Law University, and BITS Pilani. Besides. ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation), the National Police Academy, and the National Green Tribunal Regional Office, are expected to set up their offices in Amaravati.
Private companies have also shown interest in Amaravati, with Microsoft purchasing 25 acres of land for Rs 181 crore.
Additionally, Infosys, another tech giant, also plans to set up an IT hub, while HCL Technologies has allocated Rs 200 crore for a campus.
A Singapore-based consortium is set to invest Rs 500 crore in a startup hub, while companies like Panasonic, Heineken, and other big firms are also planning to establish their units.
With regard to Polavaram irrigation project, too, the Centre announced liberal release of funds to complete the project by mid-2027.
A team of foreign irrigation experts visited the project and gave suggestions to revive the pending works, which are expected to commence in the New Year.
POLITICAL CONTROVERSIES
The year also witnessed several controversies, the biggest being the statement by Naidu over the alleged use of animal fat in the preparation of the sacred Tirumala laddu under the previous YSRCP administration. The issue led to a massive political slugfest, pushing Jagan Mohan Reddy on the defensive.
Petitions were filed in the Supreme Court calling for a thorough investigation into the allegations. In response, a Special Investigation Team (SIT) headed by the CBI director was appointed to oversee the investigation.
Another major issue that rocked the state politics was the dispute within Jagan’s family over share of properties to his sister Sharmila.
The YSRCP chief filed a petition before the National Company Law Tribunal against Sharmila and mother Vijayamma, alleging that they had got the shares in Saraswati Power and Industries Pvt Ltd transferred in their name illegally.
This led to an intense war of words between Jagan and Sharmila, heating up the political atmosphere in the state.
Jagan accused Sharmila of falling into the trap of Naidu and conspired to get his bail cancelled. The issue has subsided for now, but the legal battle is still on.
Another major controversy that created ripples in the state politics was the indictment made by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which alleged that Gautam Adani had paid Rs 1750 crore ($200 million) in bribes to Jagan in 2021 to secure a power purchase agreement.
The allegation has led to a political battle in the state with Naidu accusing Jagan of tarnishing the brand image of Andhra, though he did not make any commitment on cancellation of deal with Adani.
Jagan made a desperate attempt to defend himself saying the PPA was not with Adani directly but with Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) and that deal was legitimate and beneficial for the state.
Though nothing has been proved yet, the controversy has created a big dent to the image of Jagan.
As the year is drawing to a close, the YSRCP chief has been seriously trying to regain the confidence of people by taking up a series of agitations against the Naidu government, exposing its failure to implement pre-election promises and for imposing extra burden on people with increased power charges.