In August last year, a leading movie production house in Andhra Pradesh announced a new venture — a political one — amid a lot of hype and expectation.
The timing was not wrong, just enough to make an impact on the people before they line up at polling stations to exercise their choice for the next five years. The man playing the lead role couldn’t have been better: a hugely popular film star, Chiranjeevi, with immense mass appeal among women and youth. The fact that he comes from outside the two communities — Reddys and Kammas — that have ruled the state for half-a-century though together they account for just 15 per cent of the population was a positive signal for those looking for change.
Months before the film was officially announced, the media and analysts went overboard speculating how and when it would happen and what that would mean to the two existing major political formations, the Congress of the Reddys, and the Telugu Desam of the Kammas. The launch was spectacular, with close to ten lakh people from across the state turning up for the inaugural in the temple town of Tirupati.
The name of the movie was equally attractive: Praja Rajyam. Distributors (regional leaders in other parties) and cinema hall owners (prospective candidates) lined up before the producers in a bid to buy the rights, hoping it would be a blockbuster.
But nothing went right after the muhurat shot and things slid slowly but surely. So what went wrong with the production? For one thing, Praja Rajyam never went beyond being a film production house to assume the character of a political formation in its true sense. Everything that happened in the party virtually revolved around the family — Chiranjeevi, his two brothers, Nagendra Babu and Pawan Kalyan and the star’s brother-in-law Allu Aravind, renowned in the film industry for his consummate bargaining skills and ability to squeeze the maximum returns from any Chiranjeevi movie, hit or flop.
For a film to succeed, one needs to get the ingredients right: a strong story line, good music, powerful character actors, histrionics and maybe some melodrama.
It is no different for a political party. It is surprising that a family that had spent three decades in making films didn’t understand this. Surely they had learnt their lessons from Chiranjeevi’s films that bombed because they lacked a strong theme and accompanying elements.
If insiders are to be believed, there was at least a facade of democracy in the initial stage of party formation. But it did not take long for that veneer to peel off. A few strong leaders who had come in from other parties were sidelined pretty soon because Chiranjeevi and Co did not want anyone else to have any say. There was no effort to develop a political understanding among the multitude of Chiranjeevi fans to convert them into ambassadors for the party at the grassroots. Soon, the fans too lost steam.
Intellectuals who joined Praja Rajyam, genuinely believing that here was a party that could make a difference and that they could write a strong script for it, were equally disillusioned.
When people look for a good story or a message in a film irrespective of how glamorous the hero or heroine are, would they have a different approach when it comes to a political party? Here again, Praja Rajyam failed to provide convincing answers to citizens’ concerns be it the demand for a separate Telangana state or categorisation of Scheduled Castes for the purpose of reservation.
Not surprisingly, the events unfolding in the party with just a few days to go for elections have done no good to the party. A former IPS officer, known for his integrity and knowledge, has walked out of the party, criticising it for lacking democratic functioning. An official spokeperson, who comes from a family of freedom fighters, followed suit, branding the party a commercial establishment rather than a political outfit and alleging that tickets were sold for a price without consideration for the merit of candidates. The views of another party member, a renowned sexologist who hails from a family of social reformers, were no different. None of these dissenters were politicians with intentions of making money and, therefore, people would be inclined to give their criticism credence — just as they would empathise with a middleaged widow who cried in front of TV cameras after she was denied a ticket because someone else had paid the party bosses for it. She had lost her husband, a former legislator, a couple of months back. That was when PRP leaders went to her residence, encouraged her to enter public life only to shatter her hopes later.
If today the PRP is unable to cash in on what was undoubtedly a big step — offering tickets to over 100 members from the backward classes, the highest ever given by any party in the history of Andhra Pradesh — it is because it was clouded by charges of match-fixing. For those who are unaware of this new trend in politics, it means fielding a weak candidate to benefit the rival, obviously for monetary consideration.
It is a win-win situation for party bosses. If the strong and the rich pay for a ticket, one does not lose by fielding a weak candidate either because in such cases the stronger rival of another party would only be too happy to acknowledge the favour. If pre-poll surveys are any indication, the BCs continue to remain with the TDP, whose founder N T Rama Rao heralded a new chapter by sharing political power with them when he catapulted the party to power in the early 80s. This, despite the fact that Chiranjeevi himself belongs to a caste that is seen as backward, though not recognised as one.
Assuming that these allegations are true, it is not only the PRP that is guilty of offering tickets for a consideration. The separatist Telangana Rashtra Samithi too faces similar charges. The Congress or the TDP might not be vastly different. But Chiranjeevi’s first promise to the people of this state was to be refreshingly different. And, if today, the party is in crisis, it is essentially because the message of change has not been evident to many.
When the polling booths open tomorrow morning in half of the state, comprising Telangana and north coastal Andhra, what is increasingly becoming clear is that this mega political venture is going to bomb at the box office. Only a marginally better performance is expected in the remaining parts of the state — south coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema — where the voters will press the EVM buttons a week later on April 23. The Praja Rajyam movie may run for 30 days or at best 50 days (seats) but is not likely to celebrate a silver jubilee.
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