On January 4, YS Sharmila (49), the sister of Andhra Pradesh chief minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, joined the Congress party after failing to sustain her two-year-old political outfit — YSR Telangana Party — in the hope of reviving her political career.

PREMIUM

The Congress leaders believe that it is a win-win situation. The party once reigned supreme in Andhra Pradesh — it won successive assembly elections in 2004 and 2009 — but was reduced to a non-entity in the state after its bifurcation to create Telangana. It has not won a single assembly or Lok Sabha seat in the last two terms. In the 2019 general elections, the party’s vote share was 1.29%, less than the vote share garnered by NOTA, which was 1.5%.

The reason was that most Congress leaders and party cadre shifted their loyalties to Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy, who started the YSR Congress party in 2011. Former chief minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy, former Union minister Daggubati Purandeshwari and MP Kavuri Sambasiva Rao defected to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), while others joined Chandrababu Naidu’s Telugu Desam Party (TDP).

Sharmila, who was struggling to sustain her YSR Telangana party — started in 2021 after her brother kept her out of any party or government position — decided to partner with the Congress ahead of Telangana elections held late last year. The party’s high command felt it could employ her in Andhra Pradesh to revive its lost glory.

For one, she is the daughter of former chief minister late Y S Rajasekhar Reddy (YSR), who led the Congress to victory in both 2004 and 2009 and left an indelible mark in the hearts of millions of people in the state with his welfare programmes.

“Even 14 years after his untimely death in a helicopter crash, YSR is still relevant in Andhra politics, as no successive government could do away with the welfare schemes — free power supply to farmers, Arogyasri healthcare, fee reimbursement to poor students, interest waiver for loans of self-help group women, among others. His son, Jagan Mohan Reddy, could come to power in 2019, riding on his father’s legacy and is still using YSR’s name for various schemes,” said A Venkat Reddy, political analyst and publisher.

YSR, one of the most popular mass leaders of his times, was elected to Lok Sabha four times and state assembly five times. He led several mass movements against the TDP government and was a pioneer in implementing welfare schemes. He brought the Congress back to power in Andhra Pradesh for a second time in May 2009 but died in a fatal helicopter crash in September of that year while he was on his way to Chittoor district to attend a public outreach programme

The hope is that Sharmila’s entry might attract some of the old-timers of the Congress, who had joined the YSRCP in the past but lack opportunities there.

Political analyst Suresh Dharur said the party has been in a limbo for nearly a decade. “Her entry will not lead to any dramatic results or electoral gains. But it is a step up from total oblivion to some political relevance,” he said.

Sharmila may emerge as a rallying point for YSRCP rebels who have been denied party tickets, he said, but that alone will not help in reviving the Congress. “It is a Herculean task to make even a marginal presence,” he said.

What’s in it for Sharmila?

Sharmila needs a platform to survive in politics, as she has no identity of her own, except being the daughter of YSR and sister of Jagan. The Congress is the only natural choice for her — her father died a Congressman and she can hark back to his legacy. The Congress high command is understood to have promised her a Rajya Sabha ticket from Karnataka if she takes over the reins of the party in Andhra.

Sharmila’s political ambitions are more than a decade old. Her brother was jailed in May 2012 in a Central Bureau of Investigation probe on disproportionate assets. Still fledgling at the time, the YSRCP was pushed into crisis following Jagan’s arrest. Sharmila embarked on a marathon padayatra on October 18 of that year — and went on to cover more than 3,000 km across the length and breadth of Andhra Pradesh. She completed it on August 4, 2013. Though she did not have any position in the party, she claimed herself to be “an arrow left by her brother Jagan.”

The padayatra not only established the YSRCP in every nook and corner of the state but also generated sympathy for Jagan.

Sharmila however, remained without a position in her brother’s party following his diktat that no family member should be active in politics. Though she took an active part during the 2019 assembly elections campaign, it was Jagan who returned to power.

“Apparently, Jagan did not want an alternative power centre in the government or the party, because it would bring a bad name to him and his government,” Venkat Reddy said.

Entry into Telangana

Knowing that Andhra Pradesh was tough to crack as long as her brother was in power, she decided to enter Telangana. On July 8, 2021, she floated the YSR Telangana Party on the occasion of her father’s birth anniversary and went into the people with the slogan of heralding Rajanna Rajyam, a welfare state envisaged by her father YSR.

She undertook a 3,800-km long padayatra across Telangana, hoping that she would emerge as a key player in Telangana politics. She targeted the then-ruling Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leadership, braved arrest by the police a few times and undertook intermittent hunger strikes.

Yet, Sharmila did not get much traction among the people, as she had no leadership on the ground level. Her only hope was that those who benefited from the welfare schemes rolled out by her father between 2004 and 2009 would form a solid vote bank for her.

However, Sharmila failed to attract any big leaders from other parties — even small-time leaders who joined hands with her initially made a silent exit from the party.

That’s when she began negotiations with the Congress high command, using her acquaintance with leaders like D K Shivakumar of Karnataka. She held a series of negotiations with AICC general secretary K C Venugopal and even met Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi in New Delhi and offered to merge her party with the Congress.

This isn’t to say it was smooth sailing. Sharmila reportedly faced stiff resistance from the local leaders, particularly PCC chief A Revanth Reddy, who felt that it would be counterproductive to the party, as she had Andhra roots.

She waited patiently for a favourable response, but with nobody entertaining her request, she quietly withdrew from the contest and said she would support the Congress in Telangana.

After its win in Telangana, the Congress is now focused on the upcoming Andhra Pradesh elections — here is where it hopes Sharmila will play a role in confronting her brother’s government. While it is not clear whether she will contest the elections and stand against her brother in Kadapa, a fight is clearly on the cards. Both siblings have not been on good terms for some time now — on their father’s birth and death anniversaries, they choose different timings to conduct prayers at his Samadhi in Idupulapaya in Kadapa. When she visited Jagan’s residence at Tadepalli in Guntur on January 3 to invite him to the wedding of her son Y S Raja Reddy to be held next month, she didn’t stay longer than 15 minutes.

On Friday, Sharmila told reporters that she will have clarity on her role in the Congress in the following days. “I am ready to take up any assignment in the party anywhere – whether it Andaman or Andhra Pradesh,” she said.