Abstract
The Congress, India's premier political party, ruled the South Indian state of Andhra Pradesh without interruption for nearly three decades. Even when the Congress was routed from power by the Janata party in 1977, Andhra had remained one of the few Congress strongholds. In 1983, however, a regional party, the Telugu Desam (TDP), displaced the Congress as the ruling party in Andhra. Created and led by the movie actor turned politician, N. T. Rama Rao (NTR), the Telugu Desam now appears to have established a relatively strong electoral foothold within the state. Andhra was one of the few Indian states that was not totally swept up by the Rajiv wave in the 1984 national elections, and in the 1985 legislative assembly elections, NTR's Telugu Desam again defeated the Congress Party. The mid-1987 local government elections further highlighted NTR's continuing capacity to attract the popular vote. The purpose of this essay is to explain how this political change in Andhra has come about as well as to analyze its significance. The first half is an overview of the political change and an assessment of the quality of government that has been provided by NTR's Telugu Desam. The focus in the second half of the article shifts to one district within Andhra Pradesh, Guntur, in the eastern part of the state. This specific focus helps to support the general argument with data that is not easily available for
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