Pioneer of all rath yatras: NTR's political odyssey

In the frenzied campaign for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, road shows have emerged as the most effective campaign tool, with several leaders including senior BJP leader LK Advani and Congress president Sonia Gandhi choosing this mass contact programme to win over the electorate.

However, very few outside Andhra Pradesh know about the pioneering 'rath yatra' in 1982 undertaken by the founder of Telugu Desam Party, the late NT Rama Rao, which besides catapulting him to power also entered the 'Guinness Book of Records'.

In all fairness to other leaders, it is no exaggeration to say that their road shows were no match to NTR's yatra in terms of sheer drama, curiosity, and people's response that it generated.

For the actor-turned-politician travelled nearly 40,000 kms, touring the entire state four times in nine months, ate at the wayside hotels, slept in his rath (or under trees sometimes), took bath on the roadside and did not even return to Hyderabad till the elections were announced in January 1983.

No wonder that he missed the marriage of two of his sons in the process! Christened 'Chaitanya Ratham', NTR turned his old Chevrolet van into a rath, fitted with the required paraphernalia like a revolving chair and table to work and facilities for him to rest, says his biographer and senior journalist I Venkata rao in the biography 'Oke Okkadu'.

He would climb on to the top through a hatch, Rao notes in the book. Opposition leaders of the day ridiculed NTR and his rath yatra as an extension of his celluloid histrionics and dubbed him as "Drama Rao".

Unfazed by the criticism, NTR went ahead. He would address even a small gathering of 20 people, which would soon swell in to a huge crowd, Rao says. NTR gave a new life to the forgotten Telugu songs 'Maa Telugu Talliki Mallepoodanda' (a garland of jasmine flowers for mother Telugu) and 'Cheyyetti Jai Kottu Telugoda' (praise Telugu by raising your hands), he says.

These songs stirred the listeners. By hearing these songs farm labourers would leave everything to hear NTR, Rao elaborates.

"People used to wait for days by camping on the roadside bringing along stoves, utensils and mats just to hear NTR. Villagers would post one person on the main road and ask him to signal them at the sight of NTR's rath. Women would offer him 'arathi', ask him to name their newborn kids, he says.

NTR too mingled freely with the public. He would stop at a roadside hotel to have tiffin, chat with people around, take his bath on the road and also take a doze for a while, Rao says. Driven by his son and former minister Hari Krishna, 'Chaitanya Ratham' symbolised NTR's political campaigning even when he set out to campaign against the incumbent chief minister and his son-in-law Nara Chandrababu Naidu after the latter took over as chief minister.