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TRS regime reaps its populist plans

The early sign and readings of the campaign context in Telangana in 2018 were already shaping up with a tilt towards the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS). ''Will K Chandrashekhar Rao of the TRS be able to win the second term on December 11, 2018'' was never a relevant question in the state. The second term for the TRS was a nearly sure thing and thus it finally won spectacularly with a thumping majority.

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Afroz Alam
Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad

The early sign and readings of the campaign context in Telangana in 2018 were already shaping up with a tilt towards the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS). 'Will K Chandrashekhar Rao of the TRS be able to win the second term on December 11, 2018' was never a relevant question in the state. The second term for the TRS was a nearly sure thing and thus it finally won spectacularly with a thumping majority.

This election was unique but not challenging for many reasons. 

  • First, compared to the 2014 Assembly election, the state witnessed low-voltage politics. 

  • Second, there were no scandals or corruption cases of high volume against the incumbent party to give advantage to the opposition parties. 

  • Third, interestingly, anti-incumbency was completely missing; so was the anxiety and excitement among the voters. The overall pessimism of the electorates towards the incumbent government was relatively modest. 

  • Fourth, there was no polarisation of voters on caste and communal lines and thus no consolidation of the so-called 'voting blocs' in favour of the opposition parties. Had there been polarisation, the party lines would have been hardened, volatility of the electorates reduced, and the vote division compressed in favour of the competing parties. 

On balance, these variables portend an election that was not competitive at all.

Undoubtedly, each electoral victory is based on a combination of several factors for which positive factors outweigh the negative ones. 

In terms of the negatives, the TRS was charged with promoting his dynasty, poor implementation of its populist schemes, authoritarian style of governance and rising unemployment among youths. But these factors were discounted by the substantive majority of the voters as other parties were equally not worthy in their records. 

In terms of the positives, the public approval rating of the TRS' flagship social security programmes like Shadi Mubarak, Rythu Bandhu, Rythu Bheema, Asra pension schemes, remuneration to religious clerics, residential schools, overseas minority scholarship, uninterrupted electricity, housing schemes, land distribution, and many such schemes was quite high. Most significantly, the TRS managed to keep the memories of the electorates alive regarding its populist schemes by delivering dividends till close to the election day.

The election results also show that there was no vote for change in 2018. 

In addition, as part of its electoral engineering, the TRS was helped by its Verna Model of Development, quite manifest in its schemes of offering things to caste categories as per their rank in the caste and verna hierarchy. For instance, shepherd communities were provided sheep, fishermen fish, Brahmins land, business communities corporate incentives, farmers monetary support, clergy stipends and so on. As a consequence, the caste voters, particularly Dalits, quickly forgot their immediate grievances against the TRS of not responding positively to Rohit Vemula's movement, numerous caste atrocities and making Dalit as chief minister. 

Shifting alliances irk voters

Importantly, the opposition parties and their grand alliance like the Prajakutami formed by the Congress, Telugu Desam Party (TDP), CPI, Telangana Jan Samit (TJS) and Bahujan-Left Front (BLF), and the BJP failed to present a credible alternative to the TRS.  At the same time, the fragility of opposition party alliances was conspicuously marked. These alliances also failed to impress upon their traditional voters due to shifting party alliances in the last many elections. For instance, the BJP and the TDP were together in 2014 while in 2009, the TDP drew the TRS and Left parties into alliance after jettisoning its erstwhile ally, the BJP. Interestingly, the 2018 election witnessed the alliance of opposites. The CPI and TRS that joined hands with the Congress in 2004 to defeat the TDP turned into allies with the objective of defeating the TRS in 2018 with the TDP on the Congress' side.  

These shifting alliances weakened the allegiance of the voters towards these parties. Despite the muti-cornered party alignments, the party cadres of opposition parties at booth levels became unenthused and lazy. Thus, the election in Telangana did not turn hyper-competitive. Similarly, the TDP was successfully stereotyped as the other and outsider in Telangana by TRS agents. 

Surprisingly, the Congress failed to retain its traditional support base, including the Reddys, Malas, Gowdas, Kapus, Muslims and Scheduled Tribes. Similarly, the OBC voters did not mobilise behind the TDP and shifted their allegiance to the TRS while the Kammas and other Andhra settlers remained largely with the TDP. There was also a problem for the transferability of partisan votes to other allies. Muslim voters were heavily divided as their large sections went with the TRS. But the BJP has increased its social base among the Brahmins, Marwaris, OBCs and Dalits and among anti-Muslim voters while highlighting the AIMIM as the 'enemy number one' factor.

Largely, but not entirely, the electorates of Telangana voted sensitively to actual economic experience under the incumbent TRS regime while rejecting their traditional catharsis discontents.

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