AP new trend: Parties aim at ‘religious branding’

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No political party is ready to take any chances any longer in Andhra Pradesh. The situation has come to a boiling point. The religious feelings are getting the highest preference by the parties, leaders and even the common public. So, the respective parties are literally competing to get branded and linked to one religion or the other. Even Chandrababu Naidu is not willing to ignore the rising significance of religion.

When it comes to ‘religious branding’, the BJP stands in the front line as a party totally dependent on the Hindu vote bank. But it got less than 1 percent vote share in the Hindu majority State of Andhra Pradesh in 2019. Still, the BJP leaders started dividing the Hindus in the State in the hope of destroying the TDP and grabbing power in AP in 2023 Jamili elections. Thanks to its politics of convenience, the religion came to the forefront in AP where the elections were fought along the lines of upper castes, lower castes, Dalits, BCs, Tribals and like that.

The YCP was openly branded a pro-Christian party. But it got 151 out of 175 assembly seats in 2019. It was evident that a large section of the Hindus also voted for Jagan Reddy. Because of attacks on temples now, the situation was changing now.

The TDP was recently attacking the YCP saying that it was a Christian party and Jagan a Christian CM openly. As a result, leaders of TDP Christian Cells started resigning. But, neither Chandrababu nor anybody was trying to stop them. Obviously, the TDP was trying to get the Hindu branding though indirectly. The BJP dream has come true that the Hindu cause would become predominant but the question is whether how much it would benefit out of it.

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