The latest is that the Telugu Desam Party president, N. Chandrababu Naidu is set to become the first ally to join the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) since the announcement of Narendra Modi as the Bharatiya Janata Party’s prime ministerial candidate. In recent interviews he has focused on the Congress and made no negative reference to Mr Modi or the BJP, a coded sign that he has already shifted. Other potential allies will also be watching the enormous rallies Mr Modi has and is conducting, and the fact that it is his charisma that is making them successful. Those who doubted this got a demonstration of his popularity in two successive events in September. In Rajasthan, the crowd hooted at its heroine and the state’s biggest party leader Vasundhara Raje in order to get Mr Modi on faster than he was scheduled. In Madhya Pradesh, even poor L.K. Advani was jeered and actually hastened off mid-speech. Though Mr Modi admonished the hecklers, the humiliation of Mr Advani was complete. In both instances the impatient crowds wanted to hear Mr Modi alone. The TDP split with the NDA a decade ago, ostensibly on the issue of Mr Modi’s managing of the 2002 riots. But this did not produce a reset with the electorate. The party has been unable to return to the days of founder N.T. Rama Rao, when it could sweep elections when the Congress was weak. The TDP’s share of the vote since the break-up of the NDA has actually been slipping. Andhra Pradesh is more fragmented, particularly after the Telangana movement. This means that alliances are a sensible option for a party whose best days are currently behind it. The BJP has a small but devoted core of voters in Andhra Pradesh, in the way it tends to do in many states (in this it resembles the Bahujan Samaj Party at the other end of the social spectrum). Mr Naidu’s gamble is that this will be transferred to TDP candidates and put him over the top in an election where yet another factor, the charismatic son of Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, will take away Congress votes. He has told leaders of the Left, who have been pressing him on the matter of an alliance, that his options are closed and that he must ally with the BJP if he is to have success. This will remain to be seen. However, Mr Naidu’s throwing in his lot with Mr Modi will help the BJP without doubt. And it will do so in two ways. The first is that the NDA will immediately come back into being. Today it exists but is essentially a gathering of three communal parties — the Sikh Akali Dal, the Marathi Shiv Sena and the Hindu BJP. It is nothing like the alliance that existed under Atal Behari Vajpayee. A regional party like the TDP makes it look like an inclusive body again. Word is that Mr Naidu will, in fact, again become convenor of the NDA, as he was during Mr Vajpayee’s governments. The other thing is that other potential allies attracted to Mr Modi but too afraid to be the first to openly ally with him will be given an opening to engage with the NDA. To return to the reasons why Mr Naidu was convinced about rejoining the alliance, the most important one is the popularity of Mr Modi. Any argument that Mr Modi drives away the secular vote and the minorities must be balanced by the hysteria he generates in vast numbers of people. As his electioneering gathers steam (he has not even begun the actual campaign yet) this great asset of his, the ability to talk directly and effectively with his audience, will be his most valued asset. It will get others — Mamata Banerjee in West Bengal and Naveen Patnaik in Orissa — wondering whether they are not missing out by staying away from the NDA.
Aakar Patel is a writer and columnist
