BJP central leadership doesn’t want any rupture in the party’s relationship with ruling TDP, which is also a partner in the NDA government. An announcement is expected in a week or two.
According to highly placed sources, the issue had been clinched after the meeting Andhra Pradesh chief minister Chandrababu Naidu had with BJP president Amit Shah in the company of union urban development minister M Venkaiah Naidu three days ago in New Delhi.
Haribabu is the protégé of Venkaiah Naidu. Venkaiah Naidu, of late, has become Naidu’s admirer in Andhra Pradesh. This relationship seems to have influenced the BJP leadership in appointing Haribabu for the second term.
Haribabu had excellent relationship with Chandrababu Naidu. In fact, Haribabu with state health minister Kamineni Srinivasulu forms a pro-TDP faction in state BJP while hawks such as like Purandeswari, Kanna Lakshminarayana, Somu Virraju and Kavuri Sambasiava Rao, are the other anti-Naidu group. The hawks wanted leadership change at state level and wanted the party pursue slight anti-establishment policy, which they thought, would help party grow in the state feeding on the anti-incumbency factor getting generated in the state against the TDP government.
Earlier, the leadership had been under the impression that the saffron party needed some anti-establishment posture to strike roots in Andhra Pradesh. As it was riding on the wave of success of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, immediately after the 2014 election, the party used to put up a brave front and promoted the hawks to take moderate anti-establishment stand. They raised issues like backwardness of Rayalaseema to carve out some space where the influence of TDP was minimal. But recent thinking in 11, Ashok Road, New Delhi, is that it can’t afford any rupture in the BJP-TDP relationship in Andhra Pradesh. The party is said to have asked the gang of four to keep quite. As continuation of this policy, the leadership is said to have decided to continue Kambampati Haribabu Party MP from Vizag as president of state unit for second term, which is said to have been done to please Chandrababu Naidu. As the term of the president is three years, Haribabu is expected to continue as BJP president till the next general elections in 2019.
The indications now are that 11, Ashok Road doesn’t want to upset Naidu’s apple cart, as part of its latest policy to win back the confidence of allies such as TDP, BJD etc. The BJP is now wooing Naveen Patnaik in Odisha. In Andhra Pradesh, the BJP wants Naidu to get stronger and expects reciprocation from the TDP. Extension of Haribabu’s term is said to be the new deal struck between Amit Shah and Chandrababu Naidu with mediation from Venkaiah Naidu. The wings of hawks are clearly clipped.
