During the 2025 Monsoon Session, held from 18 to 27 September, the Andhra Pradesh Assembly passed 22 bills with virtually no Opposition participation.
Published Dec 16, 2025 | 3:09 PM ⚊ Updated Dec 16, 2025 | 3:10 PM
YS Jagan (X)
Synopsis: Even after securing nearly 40 percent of the vote share in the 2024 Assembly elections, the YSRCP in Andhra Pradesh has chosen not to participate in the proceedings of the House due to the Speaker’s refusal to grant the party the status of official Opposition. YSRCP MLAs have stayed away from debates, Question Hour, and detailed scrutiny of legislation.
After the 2024 elections, nearly 40 percent of Andhra Pradesh’s voters are effectively without a voice in the state Assembly. This is not because they lack elected representatives, but because the principal opposition party chose not to participate in legislative proceedings.
The YSRCP, which secured close to 40 percent of the total vote share in the 2024 Assembly elections, has withdrawn almost entirely from the day-to-day functioning of the House. This sustained absence, more than the technical absence of a recognised Leader of the Opposition, is what has rendered the Assembly one-sided.
From the outset of the current term, YSRCP MLAs have stayed away from debates, Question Hour, and detailed scrutiny of legislation. Their boycott has hollowed out the Opposition benches, converting numerical representation into institutional silence. As a result, the interests and concerns of nearly 39.37 percent of electors find little expression during the very processes meant to hold the executive accountable.
This withdrawal is not sporadic or symbolic. During the 2025 Monsoon Session, held from 18 to 27 September, the Andhra Pradesh Assembly passed 22 bills with virtually no Opposition participation.
Although YSRCP legislators were neither expelled nor suspended, they only entered the House briefly to meet procedural requirements and exited before substantive business began. Agriculture Minister K Atchannaidu publicly described this pattern of attendance as just sufficient to avoid disqualification.
The immediate trigger for this boycott lies in the Speaker’s refusal to recognise the YSRCP as the official Opposition, citing the requirement of 10 percent strength under Speaker’s Direction No. 56. A legal challenge to this decision has been pending before the Andhra Pradesh High Court since July 2024.
However, what began as a procedural dispute has since evolved into a political strategy. Rather than engaging the government through questions, debate, or committee work, the YSRCP has chosen absence itself as its mode of Opposition.
The democratic cost of this strategy is substantial. Despite commanding 39.37 percent of the vote share, YSRCP supporters have no effective presence during Question Hour, budget discussions, or legislative debates.
With Opposition benches largely empty, scrutiny of executive action rests almost entirely with the ruling NDA, comprising the TDP, BJP and Jana Sena. Laws are enacted swiftly, but with limited interrogation, amendment, or resistance.
This silencing cannot be explained by just the numbers. Andhra Pradesh has witnessed decisive mandates in the past without such a collapse of Opposition participation.
Since 2014, the state has seen three changes in government: the TDP in 2014, the YSRCP in 2019, and the TDP-BJP-Jana Sena alliance in 2024. Each transition enabled sharp policy reversals; most notably, the Amaravati versus three-capitals question.
When these shifts occur in the absence of an engaged Opposition, long-term policy choices undergo significant changes with little sustained legislative scrutiny.
The present situation reflects a broader shift in political practice. Parties increasingly operate as electoral machines rather than legislative actors. The ruling side governs through a mandate, while the Opposition relies on boycotts rather than floor interventions.
Routine mechanisms of accountability, such as raising questions, participating in committees, and engaging in sustained debate, have steadily receded. Dissent has moved outside the Assembly, into press conferences, street mobilisation, and courtrooms.
YSRCP chief and former chief minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy defended this approach by arguing that participation with only 11 MLAs against a bloc of 164 would be politically futile.
Without formal recognition as Leader of the Opposition, he said, the Opposition leader would enjoy no greater speaking rights than an ordinary member, reducing participation to a largely symbolic act. Absence, in this framing, becomes a way of signalling what the party views as a structurally imbalanced legislature.
However, over time, this choice risks normalising a legislature without effective Opposition. What distinguishes Andhra Pradesh today is not simply the absence of a recognised Leader of the Opposition, but the presence of an organised withdrawal that renders Opposition representation largely nominal.
The Assembly continues to meet and legislate, but without the friction that gives parliamentary debate its democratic substance.
Only at this point does Andhra’s experience invite comparison with other Leader of the Opposition-less assemblies. In Sikkim, the Sikkim Krantikari Morcha’s near-total victory left no effective Opposition by design. In Nagaland, all legislators are aligned with the ruling coalition, resulting in unanimity achieved through consensus. In these cases, dissent is foreclosed by numbers rather than choice.
Elsewhere, numerical weakness has not translated into legislative silence. In Arunachal Pradesh, a lone Congress MLA continues to attend sessions and raise constituency and state-level concerns. In Gujarat and Maharashtra, small Opposition benches — despite lacking a recognised Leader of the Opposition — participate in debates, file questions, and stage walkouts.
These examples show that scrutiny can persist without formal status, provided opposition parties choose to remain present.
Against this backdrop, Andhra Pradesh stands alone with a gap between Opposition presence and Opposition participation. The absence of scrutiny here is not inevitable; it is the outcome of a deliberate political decision. Opposition MLAs remain on the rolls, but the Assembly increasingly functions as if they are not there.
India’s Leader of the Opposition-less assemblies are not a uniform phenomenon. While the absence of a Leader of the Opposition is a legal issue, the lack of dissent is a political outcome and Andhra Pradesh illustrates this distinction most starkly.
Nearly 40 percent of its electorate is formally represented, yet effectively silenced within the legislature.
(Views are personal. Edited by Muhammed Fazil.)
