In 2019, when Jagan Mohan Reddy was given an overwhelming mandate by the people of Andhra Pradesh with 151 Assembly seats and 22 MPs, people thought he would use the mandate in Parliament to obtain special status for Andhra Pradesh.
However, the BJP got an absolute majority and were therefore indifferent to the plight of Andhra Pradesh and Polavaram.
In this election, many expected the BJP to gain an absolute majority again although there was skepticism whether the NDA would cross the 400 mark.
Prior to the election, the perception was that Chandrababu needed the BJP and not the other way round. In fact, Chandrababu was even refused appointments on a couple of occasions by the Prime Minister.
But defying all expectations, the INDIA alliance put up an excellent performance denying the BJP an absolute majority and forcing it to depend on its alliance partners the TDP and JDU, to form the government.
The equation now is that the BJP needs Chandrababu and he doesn’t need them. This in short is Naidu’s good luck and Jagan’s bad luck.
