Not a day passes without him being surrounded by milling crowds trying to catch a glimpse of him. He also has many enemies, political and non-political. Despite the animosity, YS Jaganmohan Reddy, son of the late YS Rajasekhara Reddy, is continuing on the campaign trail.
While Jagan insists on any available forum that TDP's Chandrababu Naidu is his biggest rival, here are the factors against this young leader.
1. YS Jagan carries the stigma of having been jailed on the charges of graft. This isn't easy to get over, however much he and his bandwagon try to project it as the result of an effort by his rivals who are frightened of his popularity. Congress's latest mascot and actor, Chiranjeevi, joined the grand old party's leaders in saying Reddy will go to jail again. Jagan's bête noire N Chandrababu Naidu insists that he is a jailbird and he can only build jails and not a new capital city for Andhra Pradesh (the Seemaandhra region as it is called now), as he is still in the clutches of the long arm of the law. Detractors pour scorn that Jagan, if elected to power, will gobble up the entire state for his personal pecuniary gains.
2. None of his father YS Rajasekhara Reddy's close aides, including his 'Man Friday' K V P Ramachandra Rao and 'shadow' Suryudu, are sailing with Jagan. On the other hand, Rajasekhara Reddy's chums and disciples like APCC president N Raghuveera Reddy are now spewing venom at their guru's son. Ironically, Jagan never seemed to have made an attempt to reach out to them to persuade them to stand by him. At least, none in the political circles ascribe humility and persuasive skill to Jagan Reddy. On the other hand, YSR's arch rivals in politics like M V Mysoora Reddy are in his present coterie.
A term in jail has dented Reddy's chances. PTI
3. Jagan is young. This naturally is making senior leaders edgy, for they cannot take a snub or two from him. Aside from this, most of the party's elders try to arrogate seniority to themselves, despite the fact that Jagan is the president of their party, and slip into pedagogy at the drop of the hat. Jagan lacks the dexterity to cajole and tame such leaders. Instead, he chooses to let them go. For instance, the exit of MP Sabbam Hari and a lot of others is publicised more as an outcome of his arrogance rather than a result of rejecting their tall demands, as his supporters claim.
4. Most importantly, a large section of media in Andhra Pradesh is against Jagan due to myriad reasons. On the other hand, the media houses patronize the Telugu Desam Party and its helmsman Chandrababu Naidu. The degree varies thanks to Naidu's media-friendly approach. This generated a lot of goodwill for Naidu among all sections of people, especially those who depend on the news media. As if to add insult to injury, neither Jagan nor his family members grant interviews to any of the print or electronic media organisations headquartered in Hyderabad.
Like Jagan, most senior leaders of his party too are inaccessible to media. They face the charge that they neither answer nor return the calls made by even persons from media organisations that don't intentionally nurse any grievance against Jagan. In a complete contrast, leaders of the Telugu Desam Party and the Congress are proactive in keeping in touch with media persons and media owners – be it newspapers or TV channels or even new media.
5. Jagan's party doesn't seem to be imparting any training or doing any background exercise to groom its spokespersons to present his party's standpoint on criticism of YSR and Jagan or policy issues during TV talk shows, which have a lot of viewership. While those representing the TDP are thorough with the subjects they are handling or are dexterous at bulldozing through using lung power, YSRC leaders are often caught off-guard and fail to counter the high-octane criticism.
6. Jagan, for reasons best known to him, is convinced that any political party can exist only in one region of the about-to-be bifurcated Andhra Pradesh. It is for this reason that he has apparently deliberately ignored nursing the party in Telangana, though the late YSR still enjoys considerable popularity among the masses in this region.
Thus, he has alienated himself in the region, taking a strong anti-Telangana stand unlike other parties which played to the gallery.
7. Jagan is accused of being autocratic, failing to encourage the growth of a second rung of leadership and also at the grassroots level which is vital for any political party. The enforcement of a bandh call given by the YSR Congress on a few occasions earlier had exposed the lack of organizational set-up that percolated down to villages.
8. Jagan hasn't been able to allay fears that he might end up doing another Chiranjeevi and merge his party with the Congress after the elections.
9. His wavering stand on Narendra Modi in the garb of being a "modern day politician" and in asserting that Modi is not an "untouchable" have made Muslim vote bank eye him suspiciously. Though for the record, he tried to enlist the support of several national leaders by meeting them personally, he has never been able to portray himself as a cobbler of a national alternative to the Congress or the BJP.
10. The exit of inconsequential leaders from the party is magnified by unfriendly media and entry of powerful leaders is willfully downplayed, if not vilified. Furthermore, the exodus of leaders from the Congress into the Telugu Desam is amplifying the buzz that TDP's stock in the public eye is soaring. Jagan doesn't seem to have attempted to negotiate with any leader who left the party so far, leaving them high and dry.
The admirers of YSR Reddy accuse his son of lacking connect with the people and the political acumen to hold his flock together unlike his father. Can Jagan overcome these limitations to trounce his opponents at the hustings is a conjecture. After all, as the political heir of YSR, he has large boots to fill.
11. Actor Pawan Kalyan, who has been taking potshots at Jagan only through oblique references of imprisonment on charges of corruption and subsequent release on bail without taking his name, is the new thorn in the flesh for Jagan's party.
The actor, who is a rage among the younger generation, openly pledged support to Narendra Modi and desired that he became the Prime Minister. Against this background, if the Bharatiya Janata Party enters into an electoral alliance with the TDP, the dots can be easily connected.It means that Pawan Kalyan would be extending tacit support to the TDP. This should surely be a cause of worry for Jagan.
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