Hyderabad: For weeks now, Andhra Pradesh IT, electronics and HRD minister Nara Lokesh has been engaged in a carefully planned public relations exercise, meeting MLAs, MPs and MLCs of the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) at his Mangalagiri (Undavalli) residence.
The outreach, mainly elaborate dinner get-togethers involving elected representatives and their family members, is meant to increase his political goodwill and build rapport, some of the attendees have told ThePrint.
The overtures have also discomfited some alliance members, who have termed the outreach as an “overreach”, setting off a range of conversations across the state’s political class.
Within Lokesh’s TDP (Telugu Desam Party), however, the reaction has been largely congratulatory, with the exception of a few quiet whispers on the outcome of the exercise.
Nearly two years into government since the 2024 assembly poll, elected members from the TDP favouring Lokesh’s outreach have termed the exercise of “establishing roots and building relationships” much more than an effort due to being Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu’s son.
“This is a conscious exercise to be known beyond the CBN tag. It is about imprinting a Mangalagiri stamp on everything he stands for,” a senior party member from Visakhapatnam told ThePrint.
From personally handing dinner plates to guests to initiating conversations by putting an arm around an associate of many years, his courteous gestures of affection with people across all ages stand out, attendees from the TDP, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Jana Sena Party (JSP) reckoned. The TDP-JSP combine, in alliance with the BJP, had won the Andhra elections in a landslide victory against Jagan’s YSR Congress Party in 2024.
Wives of legislators and women MLAs from each constituency were given the popular Mangalagiri sarees while couples were also given an idol of Mangalagiri Lakshmi Narasimha Swami and his consort Lakshmi Devi, the attendees said.
Political commentators who have laboured to understand the working styles of Naidu and his son Lokesh shared that the CM has a cherished and chummy working relationship with people, but lacks personal connection with the public.
“Everyone is a resource. With Naidu walking up the ranks from being a student leader in the Sri Venkateswara University to being a recognised force in the TDP, he knows every individual by his capability. And they defer to Naidu because he is so thorough as a politician and an administrator. In this light, personal connection would be a key differentiator between father and son,” Chandrashekhar Reddy, a former professor of political science at Sri Krishnadevaraya University, told ThePrint.
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‘Every move has been intentional’
Lokesh was elected as an MLC in 2017 and was also made cabinet minister that year during Naidu’s first term as CM. However, he won his first election in 2024 from Mangalagiri, a temple town that is also a major textile hub, with a margin of 91,413 votes, defeating YSRCP’s Murugudu Lavanya. The margin of victory in the constituency was the highest for the TDP in 39 years. The feat thrust him into the limelight after a sluggish performance in 2019 when he lost to YSRCP’s Alla Ramakrishna Reddy.
TDP insiders ThePrint spoke to admitted that they have been both pleasantly surprised and taken aback by Lokesh’s sincerity. “If there was anyone born with a silver spoon, it was Lokesh. In 1983, (TDP founder) N.T. Rama Rao was already the chief minister when he was born, and so the privilege of position was already a birthright,” a TDP leader from Hyderabad who has known Lokesh since his childhood said.
After Lokesh’s loss in 2019, there were calls of disapproval and even his supporters pitched for a conscious investment in his own making. The TDP’s loss in the 2019 state poll and his own drubbing in 2019 are known to have led Lokesh to reflect and course correct.
“From appointing a tutor to improve his conversational Telugu to going through a rigorous diet regime to lose weight, every move has been intentional. In fact, when I told him to arrest his weight loss, he replied that he had to lose two more kilos to meet his target,” a BJP MLA from Andhra Pradesh told ThePrint.
Lokesh’s transformation has been in the making since 2023. After the Yuva Galam Padayatra in January 2023 where he walked for 400 days and lived amid the public, he is learnt to have realised that election time appearances are not enough.
“While it could prevent an embarrassing defeat, there needs to be an emotional bond with the people,” a senior party leader who has been with the TDP since 1992 said.
Lokesh’s trips to Vizag seem to support what analysts and his partymen say. He is known to spend an hour every day during his trip to collect petitions from people who seek redressal for everyday issues.
As HRD minister, school visits to Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalayas (KGBV) in Vizag, Bheemli, and Chandrapalem are not part of the circuitous itinerary set by the party. Instead, he chooses to walk into classrooms himself without being accompanied by officers or partymen.
Lokesh’s assertiveness is also visible in the choice of political appointments in the state. M.V. Pranav Gopal’s appointment as Visakhapatnam Metropolitan Region Development Authority’s chairman is a case in point, besides that of several others.
Enugala Peddi Reddy, who has been with the TDP since NTR’s times in the 1980s, attested to Lokesh’s evolution as a leader.
“Earlier, he was good only at maths. Now, I see him taking control of the party, liaisoning in Delhi, and moving amid people in the state. But he needs to work harder and become an independent personality like Jagan (YSRCP founder and former CM). The PR game is good though,” he said.
Another endorsement came from an unexpected quarter. Veteran Congress leader and former CM Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy’s confidant K.V.P. Ramachandra Rao spoke highly of Lokesh for resolving his land issues in Andhra Pradesh. KVP, in fact, made known his appreciation for him on social media.
Some apprehension
While leaders such as Prakash Reddy (BJP) believe that Lokesh’s outreach will not go unmissed when the government is put to test in 2029, some others are apprehensive.
“If goodwill is the intended political outcome, then the exercise is a success. But if it is about occupying the CM’s chair, there is still a long way to go,” a TDP leader from Nellore told ThePrint.
Andhra Pradesh leaders of the JSP and BJP admitted to watching Lokesh’s moves closely.
Being part of the NDA alliance, they fear having to work under Lokesh. They acknowledge that the TDP’s groundswell is key to coming back to power in 2029, but are equally critical of Naidu’s son.
Considering he has no real background in contesting or organising mandal and zilla level politics and polls, they call him a “wild card entry” who is lucky to intern with his father. In fact, some of them go to the extent of referring to both Jagan and Lokesh as non-locals. Both children of chief ministers, born and raised in Hyderabad, they are said to retreat to their cosmopolitan lives in Bangalore and Hyderabad when their parties are not in power.
Lokesh has been circumspect in his remarks about his alliance partners, his supporters said.
“He understands that the BJP’s support is important. He grudgingly acknowledges (JSP chief) Pawan Kalyan’s charisma and street power. But he knows that he is the TDP’s TINA (There is No Alternative) factor.”
(Edited by Nida Fatima Siddiqui)
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