N. T. Rama Rao - Political Career

Political Career

NTR entered politics in early 1982, following widespread reports in the media about his mulling an entry into politics. He founded the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) on 29 March 1982 in Hyderabad. His stated reason for entering politics and launching his own party was based on a historic need to rid Andhra Pradesh of the corrupt and inept Congress rule, which had governed the state since its formation in 1956 and whose High Command had changed the Chief Minister five times in five years. At a time when the then Prime Minister of India Indira Gandhi was cracking down on state governments led by opposition parties, NTR was one of the very few leaders who stood up to Gandhi. The popularity of NTR was such among the people of Andhra Pradesh that a jittery Congress decided to hold early elections in January 1983 instead of August 1983 as scheduled.

In the elections, the TDP allied with another party called Sanjaya Vichara Manch and decided to field educated candidates who had a good name in the society and were not indulging in corruption, which was an innovative political concept at the time. NTR himself decided to contest from 2 assembly constituencies, Gudivada and Tirupati. NTR used many innovative ways of campaigning, such as being the first politician in India to use rath yatras for campaigning. For this, he used a modified Chevrolet van which he named as Chaitanya Ratham. In this van, NTR travelled across the state of Andhra Pradesh, crisscrossing all the districts. With his son Nandamuri Harikrishna, also a film actor, driving the van, NTR notched up over 75,000 kilometres during his campaign, a distinctive sight with the van's yellow party flags and banners and NTR sitting on top of the vehicle hailing the crowds. NTR campaigned for restoring the dignity of the Telugu people and advocated the forming a closer bond between the government and the common people, going into the elections with the slogan, Telugu Vari Atma Gauravam (lit. Telugu people's self-respect).

In the elections, the TDP won by an aboslute majority, winning 199 out of the 294 seats in the state assembly, with NTR himself winning from both the seats he contested. Their alliance with the Sanjaya Vichara Manch fetched 202 seats. NTR was sworn in as the 10th and the first non-Congress Chief Minister of the state on 9 January 1983 with 10 cabinet ministers and five ministers of State.

On 15 August 1984, NTR was removed from office by the then-governor Ramlal. His finance minister, Nadendla Bhaskara Rao, a former Congressman who joined the TDP during its inception, was made the Chief Minister by Ramlal. Bhaskar Rao purportedly had the support of majority MLA's (Members of Legislative Assembly of Andhra Pradesh) which was never the case. NTR disputed the claims by Bhaskara Rao and demonstrated his strength by bringing all the MLA's supporting him, which was a majority in the 294 member assembly, to the Raj Bhavan (Governor's Office). Ramlal did not relent and NTR then campaigned for restoration of democracy by mobilizing the support of people and various anti-Congress political parties in the country including the Janata Party (JP), the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Left Front, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), and the National Conference (NC). During the one month crisis, the MLAs supporting NTR were secured in a secret place to avoid horse-trading. Due to mobilization of several political parties and the people and due to bad press, Indira Gandhi, unwillingly removed Governor Ramlal and appointed a Congress veteran, Shankar Dayal Sharma, as the governor of Andhra Pradesh to pave the way for restoring NTR. Shankar Dayal Sharma removed Bhaskara Rao from power and restored NTR as the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh in September 1984.

A month later, Indira Gandhi was assassinated. Her son Rajiv Gandhi became Prime Minister in her place. In the ensuing national elections to the Lok Sabha, the Congress, riding on the sympathy wave caused by Gandhi's assasination, won convincingly all over the country except in Andhra Pradesh where the TDP secured a landslide victory. TDP achieved the rare distinction of becoming the first regional party to become the main opposition party in the Lok Sabha. Menawhile in the state, NTR recommended dissolution of the Assembly and called for fresh elections the following year in the state the following year to ensure the people had a fresh choice to elect their representatives. The TDP again won with a massive majority in those elections, with NTR winning from 3 seats; Hindupur, Nalgonda and Gudivada. Senior Leaders of the Congress in the state including former Chief Ministers Kasu Brahmananda Reddy and Kotla Vijaya Bhaskara Reddy lost in their constituencies of Narasaraopet and Kurnool respectively to the TDP.

NTR completed his five-year term as Chief Minister. In the December 1989 assembly elections however, he was voted out of power due to a wave of anti-incumbency sweeping the state and the Congress returned to power. NTR himself lost from Kalwakurthy by a narrow margin to the Congress, but retained the Hindupur assembly seat. During this time, he had suffered a mild stroke, as a result of which he was unable to campaign. However during this period, he established himself in national politics, forming a coalition of non-Congress parties opposed to the Congress known as the National Front. It included parties, besides the TDP, such as the Janata Dal, the DMK, the Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) and the Indian Congress (Socialist). This alliance governed India between 1989-1991 with support from the Left Front and the BJP, with the Congress supporting it later after the BJP withdrew support in 1990. Meanwhile, NTR assumed the position as the Leader of Opposition in the state.

NTR returned to power in the December 1994 state assembly elections with his party in alliance with the Left Front. This alliance won 250 seats in the 294 seat Assembly, with the TDP alone winning 226. The Congress, which once again had multiple Chief Ministers in the state during its five year rule between 1989-1994, won only 26 seats. NTR contested again from Hindupur and won the seat for the third consecutive time, achieving a rare hat-trick of wins from the same assembly constituency. He also won from another assembly constituency, Tekkali.

NTR's third term only lasted 9 months. On 23 August 1995, NTR was unceremoniously removed as Chief minister. NTR's son-in-law Nara Chandrababu Naidu engineered an internal party coup against him and took over as Chief Minister on 1 September 1995. He was also chosen as president of the TDP by party members. Naidu claimed that the reason for overthrowing NTR was that the latter was planning to hand over the reins of the party to his second wife Lakshmi Parvathi, also claiming that the party was in danger of disintegrating under her rule. Most of the TDP MLA's sided with Naidu and camped at the Viceroy Hotel in Hyderabad, the centre of the revolt. NTR's sons Nandamuri Harikrishna, Nandamuri Balakrishna and his other son-in-law Daggubati Venkateswara Rao played a crucial role in the coup but all of them fell out with Naidu soon afterwards. The reason for this is that Naidu is said have promised to make Venkateswara Rao the Deputy Chief Minister and Harikrishna the party's general secretary, but he sidelined all of them soon after becoming the Chief Minister and Party President. In an emotional interview after the coup, NTR called the coup a planned treachery and lambasted Naidu for being power-hungry and untrustworthy, likening him to Aurangzeb, the Mughal Emperor who jailed his father and killed his siblings to become the King of the Mughal Empire.