Hyderabad
As the polling date for elections in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana approaches, political parties have stepped up their campaign with hundreds of well-decorated vans, cars, and buses zipping around, playing some catchy songs, and praising the parties and their leaders.
But there is one common denominator in all the songs: all of them are written, composed, and sung by Narsi Reddy, alias Narsanna and his team. His songs have become so popular that they played a major role in the electoral victories of Congress, the Telugu Desam Party, MIM, YSRCP, and Jana Sena.
The songs that he sang for Telangana PCC leader A Revanth Reddy in the 2023 Assembly election and the one he sang for YSRCP President YS Jagan Mohan Reddy drew millions of views on YouTube and went viral on various social media platforms.
If you visit any remote village or town in the two Telugu States during the election time, you will hear Narsi Reddy’s songs. Laced with a rustic voice and a tinge of late balladeer Gaddar’s voice, Narsi Reddy’s songs have become mascots of various political parties.
Interestingly, the lyrics of his songs, often filled with Telangana idioms and slang, have been well received in Andhra Pradesh.
An Intermediate (Plus 2) pass-out, Narsanna, who is also called Nalgonda Gaddar, did several odd jobs, including driving, before attempting to sing songs for political leaders during elections.
“It (the success) has not happened overnight. As I was working as a cab driver in the late 1990s, I started singing for various political leaders,” Narsi Reddy told businessline.
Narsanna’s team banks on tunes of popular Telangana folk songs, a good number of them from the Left movement, and weaves around a narrative on a political party or a leader.
He first met success in 1999 when he was working with Congress leader Komatireddy Venkata Reddy (who is an influential minister in the Revanth Reddy Cabinet). “I didn’t look back after that,” the 47-year-old singer from Nalgonda said.
He, however, made it a point not to give performances on the dais of any political party. “I don’t like to give performances during elections because I don’t want to take sides. I don’t distinguish between parties or leaders. We work with all the parties and leaders, whoever wants us to prepare campaign songs for them,” he said.
Interestingly, he also sang an election campaign song in Telugu for MIM President Asaduddin Owaisi, whose traditional voters are Urdu speakers. Similarly, he sang a song for his political opponents in the BJP in Telangana.
In Andhra Pradesh too, his team composed songs for the arch-rivals YSRCP and Telugu Desam Party, eulogising the party’s presidents and criticising their opponents for trying to put spokes in the development agenda.