Will The Godavari Dists. Sentiment Favor TDP This Time?

The Godavari districts largely dictate the political trends in Andhra Pradesh. Whichever party gets the majority of the approval in the Godavari districts will have the natural edge and form the government in Andhra Pradesh.

In 2014, the Godavari districts gave 26 out of the 34 assembly constituencies to Telugu Desam and only 5 to YCP. East Godavari, the biggest segment in terms of the number of assembly constituencies gave 12 seats to TDP then. And we all know what happened later as the TDP+ alliance formed the government with a comprehensive margin.

In 2019, the Godavari districts rallied with YCP by giving the Jagan party 27/34 seats. As is known, YCP won the election by a historic margin. By this, we can deduce that the Godavari districts essentially decide which party forms the government in AP.

If we observe the trend in the Godavari districts, particularly the East Godavari segment, the TDP+ alliance wave is overwhelming. This could be seen in Chandrababu and Pawan Kalyan’s meeting in Amalapuram today. While the massive public turnout to the joint meeting is one thing, the loud cheers and slogans raised by the public were deafening.

The humongous crowds paired with the public response were so enormous that Chandrababu, who has been in politics for over 40 years said he hasn’t seen such a public movement in his life.

For the past few days, the mass turnouts for Chandrababu and Pawan’s meetings have been suggesting that the Godavari districts are rallying behind the TDP+ alliance. If so, then the alliance could be on course for a huge win in the AP polls.

With that being said, we must also wait for Jagan to set foot in the Godavari districts and see the kind of public turnout that he sees. If he can pull crowds on par with the alliance meetings, then we have to wait till the polling day to see which party is favored by the Godavari districts. If not, the result could be decided even before the polls in favor of the alliance.