Andhra bureaucrats' tryst with politics is riddled with fiascos

At a time when Andhra’s political circles were abuzz with a debate about whether people would accept the ambitious repositioning of Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) as Bharatiya Rashtra Samiti (BRS) by Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR), three former bureaucrats, hailing from Andhra Pradesh, sprang a surprise by joining the outfit.

Thota Chandrasekhar (former IAS officer from Maharashtra cadre), Ravela Kishore Babu (former IRTS officer), and Chintala Parthasarathi (former IRS officer) joined the BRS and KCR was quick to appoint Chandrasekhar the president of Andhra Pradesh BRS unit.

KCR is generally perceived as anti-Andhra and many cite the letters he wrote to the Centre to stall the irrigation projects being planned in Rayalaseema and Polavaram in coastal Andhra as a testimony to it. What surprises many is the haste with which the trio joined hands with KCR even though the BRS’ stand on Andhra projects is not made public. It appears they are desperate to win the election in 2024 lest their political career would be at stake.

Also read: KCR’s TRS turns BRS: Masterstroke or misadventure?

Chandrasekhar came cropper at polls

Chandrasekhar’s track record as an able administrator in Maharashtra did not help him in the elections he fought in Andhra Pradesh. He quit Indian Administrative Service at the peak of his popularity to join the Praja Rajyam Party (PRP) floated by megastar Chiranjeevi in 2008. He contested from the Guntur Lok Sabha seat, but ended third in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections. Following the merger of PRP with Congress, he joined YSR Congress and unsuccessfully fought from the Eluru constituency in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.

Disillusioned, he left YSRC to join movie star Pawan Kalyan’s Jana Sena party. However, the 1987-batch IAS officer faced his third successive defeat as Jana Sena candidate from the Guntur West Assembly constituency in 2019.  Now, he wants to test his luck in the company of KCR.

Similarly, former IRS officer Chintala Parthasarathi’s political career also started on a sour note. He lost the Lok Sabha election in 2019 as the Jana Sena nominee from Anakapalli and quit the party thereafter. He has now joined the BRS.

Also read: TRS is now Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) officially; KCR unfurls party flag

Former IRTS officer Ravela Kishore Babu, on the other hand, tasted success on his debut as a TDP candidate from the Prathipadu Assembly constituency. TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu inducted Ravela, who was once OSD to former Lok Sabha speaker GMC Balayogi, into the cabinet. However, he was dropped from the cabinet in 2017. Infuriated, Ravela jettisoned TDP to join Jana Sena before the 2019 election and unsuccessfully contested from the same constituency.  Later, he joined the BJP. Now, he has ditched the BJP too to sail with the BRS.

Success eludes bureaucrats-turned-politicians

In the past two-and-a-half decades, the number of former bureaucrats in Telugu politics has been on the rise. However, their success rate in the elections is poor.

The trend began in 1999 when TDP’s Chandrababu Naidu fielded former CBI director K Vijaya Rama Rao from the Khairatabad Assembly constituency in Hyderabad. Rao won the seat and went on to become a minister in Naidu’s cabinet.

Also read: Liberation vs integration: TRS, BJP spar on Sept 17 celebration in Telangana

The other former babu to win the general election along with Rao was N Venkataswamy. A retired IAS officer from the state, Venkataswamy was elected to Lok Sabha from Tirupati as a BJP candidate backed by the TDP. But, Rao lost the next two elections in 2004 and 2009 from the same constituency when the TDP fortunes were on the decline. In 2016, after the formation of Telangana, Rao quit the TDP to join the TRS. Similarly, Venkataswamy too could not succeed again.

Trend of babus in politics picked up after 1999

Before 1999, former civil servants were rare in politics. The first former civil servant to enter the Lok Sabha from Andhra Pradesh was MT Raju, a retired ICS officer. The former chief secretary of Andhra Pradesh represented the Narsapur constituency as a Congress candidate between 1971 and 77. Exactly after 20 years, Congress fielded another retired IPS officer, PV Rangaiah Naidu, from Khammam in 1991 who became Union minister of state for communications in PV Narasimha Rao’s cabinet. Naidu retired as DGP earlier.

While the state saw just two retired babus in politics before 1999, their number started growing there onwards. JD Seelam, a Karnataka Cadre Telugu IAS officer, quit the service to join the Congress in 1999. He was fielded from the Bapatla Lok Sabha constituency in 1999. He lost the election but was able to secure a Rajya Sabha nomination in 2004. Later, he became a central minister in his second stint in the Upper House.

Also read: Why Bandi Sanjay Kumar is BJP’s answer to KCR’s clout in Telangana

Later, former Karnataka DGP Tirupati Srinivasulu also entered the AP Legislature as Congress MLC in 2007. Another IPS officer from Tripura cadre, Reddappa Reddy, was also nominated to the Legislative Council by YSR.

The advent of Praja Rajayam, Jana Sena, YSR Congress, Lok Satta, TRS, and the arrival of Narendra Modi at the Centre seem to have opened the gates for more ex-Babus to enter politics.

2009: Not a good year

In 2009, Lok Satta, the popular civil society organisation launched by former IAS officer Dr Jayaprakash Narayan, was converted into a political party. He fielded candidates in as many as 246 constituencies in the 2009 Assembly polls. However, the party’s performance was so dismal that barring Dr Narayan none could win the election. He won the Kukatapally Assembly seat.

Similarly, Thota Chandrasekhar and N Ramarao (both former IAS officers from Maharashtra), who resigned from IAS to take a political plunge, contested the elections as PRP candidates from Guntur and Bapatla respectively, and lost. TDP fielded ex-IRS officer Malyadri Sriram from Bapatla Lok Sabha Constituency, but he also lost to the Congress’ Panabaka Lakshmi.

2014: Mixed results

Dr Jayaprakash Narayan chose to contest from Malkajgiri in Hyderabad in 2014, but faced defeat. He had to quit electoral politics once and for all in disgust. It was a bad year for many former civil servants who wanted to make it big in politics.  Another ex-babu who met the same fate as Lok Satta chief was former DGP V Dinesh Reddy. Immediately after his retirement, Reddy joined YSR Congress and entered the poll fray from Malkajgiri. His tenure as top cop of the state could not come to his rescue.  As YSRC could not fulfil his dream of becoming an MP, within months after his defeat, he joined the BJP in August 2014.

Also read: How YS Sharmila has emerged as a serious player in Telangana politics

Another YSRC nominee who lost the election in 2014 was 1990 batch IAS officer K Chandramouli. He unsuccessfully took on TDP supremo Chandrababu Naidu in the Kuppam constituency. Though he was fielded from Kuppam again in 2019, he could not succeed.

Another IAS officer who could not realise her dream of becoming an MP in the 2014 elections was Chaya Ratan, a 1977 batch IAS officer. She contested from the Secunderabad Lok Sabha constituency as an AAP candidate and ended up in sixth position with just 11,184 votes.

However, three former civil servants fielded by the TDP emerged victorious in the elections. Of them, Malyadri Sriram, and Dr Pandula Ravi Babu (both Ex-IRS) won from Bapatla and Amalapuram Lok Sabha constituencies, respectively, while Ravela Kishore Babu was elected to Assembly from Prathipadu.

2019: Dismal run continues

The 2019 elections saw more ex-babus entering the electoral arena. As many as 20 former IAS officers tried their luck in Assembly and Lok Sabha elections. The list included high-profile former CBI joint director and Maharashtra cadre IPS office VV Lakshminarayana. Lakshminarayana, as CBI joint director, acquired cult status with his daredevil approach in arresting YS Jaganmohan Reddy in the disproportionate assets cases. This public adulation forced him to jump into public life after taking VRS from the service. He joined the Jana Sena party led by Pawan Kalyan and contested from the Visakhapatnam Lok Sabha constituency. Thota Chandrasekhar (ex-IAS), M Ramarao (ex-IRS), and Chintala Partha Sarathi (ex-IRS) and, Ravela Kishore Babu (ex-IRTS) were the Jana Sena candidates. On the other hand, YSRC fielded Chandragiri Yesuratnam (former IPS) from Guntur West and SM Iqbal (former IPS) from Hindupur. All faced drubbing.

Post-2019 many former IAS officers chose to join the BJP which included former Andhra Pradesh chief secretary IYR Krishna Rao, Karnataka former chief secretary A Ratnaprabha, retired IAS officer Dasari Srinivasulu, etc. In 2021, Ratnaprabha unsuccessfully contested the Tirupati Lok Sabha bypoll as BJP nominee.

However, a different trend has been witnessed in Telangana where many IAS officers (KV Ramanachari, S Chellappa, and AK Goel) joined TRS, but remained aloof from electoral politics. The only ex-Babu who became MLC was P Venkatarami Reddy (IAS) who famously touched the feet of chief minister KCR when he was the collector of Siddipet in full public glare. Later, he took voluntary retirement at the instance of KCR who nominated him to the Legislative Council.

Not cut out for politics?

Though more former bureaucrats are joining electoral politics, their success rate remains dismal. According to Md Shafiquzzaman, a 1977-batch IAS officer, they lose the battle of ballots mainly because they are not cut out for politics.

“While parties love to promote civil servants, people reject them as they do not measure up to the conventional image of a political leader. In the good old days, the interaction between officers and the chief minister was minimal. Nobody was interested in electoral politics. Now, there is too much political interference in transfers and postings and beneficiary officers love to reciprocate it. This is the reason for political ambition among a section of babus,” Shafiquzzaman said.

Prof K Srinivasulu, a noted political scientist and retired faculty from Osmania University, said former bureaucrats’ entry into politics is not driven by any ideology or commitment.  “In the era of liberalisation, bureaucrats enjoy enormous state power and political clout through their proximity with the powers that be. They acquire all resources to contest the elections. Caste consideration is also at play when choosing the ex-babus as candidates. It is no surprise if their number goes up in politics in the future,” Srinivasulu said.

Against this backdrop, it will be quite interesting to see how the three former bureaucrats who joined the BRS last week could inspire the voters in favour of KCR with their poor electoral track record.