The fate of about 2.6 lakh village and ward volunteers in Andhra Pradesh is uncertain after Naidu’s TDP overthrew Jagan Mohan Reddy’s YSRCP.
YS Jagan Mohan Reddy rolled out the volunteer system after assuming power in 2019.
The fate of about 2.6 lakh village and ward volunteers in Andhra Pradesh is in limbo following the change of guard in the state.
Among them, the plight of about 49,000 volunteers, who had resigned ahead of the general elections, is much worse. They were made to resign on the promise of hiring them back once the YSRCP returned to power.
However, the volunteer system was initiated by former chief minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, and a majority of those who resigned had worked for the YSRCP. It is now doubtful if the TDP-led government would absorb them again as volunteers.
Those who did not resign, too, are in a quandary. There is no clear assurance from the new government that they would be retained or assigned some other government duties.
The first Cabinet meeting of the N Chandrababu Naidu government on 24 June did not convey any good news to them.
“It has been decided that the staff of the village and ward secretariat would be used to deliver the benefits under the welfare schemes to the beneficiaries at their doorsteps. We have not discussed on the volunteers,” Information and Public Relations Minister Kolusu Parthasarathy said after the Cabinet meeting.
Those who have resigned are staging demonstrations across the state, demanding that they should be reinstated. In several districts, they staged demonstrations and made representations to the TDP leaders, requesting to reinstate them.
Some of them lodged complaints against former YSRCP minster Kodali Nani in Gudivada in Krishna district and several other YSRCP leaders, saying they were forced to resign with the promise of taking them back as volunteers again after the party came to power.
But the party was defeated at the hustings, leaving the volunteers high and dry. They alleged that YSRCP leaders had told them that only those who would resign would be drafted in as village volunteers. If they did not resign, they would not considered for continuing in service.
Ahead of the Assembly elections, the Andhra Pradesh High Court ordered that the village and ward volunteers should not be deployed to deliver the benefits of welfare schemes to the poor. Before the elections, they delivered the benefits to the beneficiaries at their doorsteps.
Jagan brought in the system after coming to power in the state in 2019.
Each volunteer was in charge of 50 to 70 households. They were tasked with helping households in need, delivering pensions, and conducting various surveys for the government to formulate policies. They were paid ₹5,000 per month as remuneration.
They did an exemplary work when Covid-19 struck the state. They appeared like a formidable army of Jagan. Though they were supposed to do government work, they subsequently became YSRCP’s endoskeleton, causing jitters to the Opposition TDP and Jana Sena.
The band of volunteers became an invisible link between the government and the party. They were neither the government nor the party, but just volunteers.
Jagan positioned this “invisible” army of the party in all villages and wards, keeping in mind the 2024 elections. Though his calculations of returning to power with the help of the volunteers went wrong, they were a major force no one could ignore.
Though Pawan Kalyan had castigated the volunteers, accusing them of involving themselves in illegal activities in the garb of doing government work, he later mellowed down when Naidu said he would not disturb the set-up. He even promised to double their remuneration.
He wanted to steal the volunteers from the YSRCP offering an additional ₹5,000 after coming to power.
Now, the ball is in the government’s court. The TDP and Jana Sena were afraid that the YSRCP would use the data collected by village volunteers for profiling voters to roll out custom-made programmes to win over the electorate.
As the number of volunteers who are left high and dry is huge, the state government is cautious. No one in the government has said anything about abolishing the system.
Even Parthasarathy, after the Cabinet meeting, said that the volunteer system would continue but the government had not decided yet as to how to use them. He was referring to the volunteers who had not resigned and kept away from the polls. The government remained non-committal on those who had resigned, knowing well that most of them had worked for the YSRCP.
Nimmala Rama Naidu, after taking over as Irrigation Minister, said that the volunteer system was intact.
“The volunteers were asked not to attend to their regular duties during the elections. They were paid a remuneration by the previous government. The present government will review the situation and may use them in a different form,” he said, adding that their services would be utilised in such a way that there would be no diluting of the role of the village and ward secretariats.
Prof DAR Subrahmanyam, chairman of the Navyandhra Intellectual Forum, said no one knows what would happen to those who had resigned.
“There is uncertainty over continuing the present system. If the TDP government decides to do away with them, even those who did not resign would be left in a lurch. At present the ministers are not saying whether the government would abolish the system or not,” he said.
Another analyst Palwai Raghavendra Reddy said that the village volunteer system has helped the TDP learn the lesson that such initiates, however well-meaning, could prove counterproductive.
“In Andhra Pradesh, the village volunteers replaced the YSRCP cadres, who are dyed-in-the-wool party workers. The volunteers though they did the work for YSRCP were not full-time activists like the hardcore party workers,” he said.
“The volunteer system seems to have favoured the TDP. Otherwise, there was no way that Chandrababu Naidu would win a brute majority. As regards the volunteers’ plight, it is unlikely that the TDP would consider them kindly after knowing that they had worked for the YSRPC,” Reddy further said.
“Now, after reducing the YSRCP to 11 seats in the Assembly, Naidu need not be worried about the village volunteers, whether they had resigned or not,” he added.”
(Edited by Majnu Babu)
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