Kammas Incorporated

Vishakhapatnam is well decorated with flowering gardens and smart roads. On a huge arc of seafront,a docked submarine has been made into a museum for kids. From Kailasa hill, the famous Dolphin’s Nose promontory juts into the sea. Many kamma fortunes have been made at this bustling port.

Once a rural landowning caste, today the kamma industrialists are the foremost business community of Andhra, a crucial support base for the TDP. Kammas dominate the urban industrial economy. M. Venkat Rao, major contractor and owner of Cable Vision, a private TV channel, is a kamma. Ramoji Rao, owner of the ‘Enadu’ group is a kamma. The owner of the Seven Hills hospital chain in Andhra is a kamma. MVVS Murthy, owner of a bottling plant and the TDP Lok Sabha candidate from Vishakhapatnam is also a kamma. Venkaiah Naidu, BJP president, is a kamma. Owners of the Kamnaini Hospitals are kammas. Film producer Rama Naidu is also a kamma. So what’s the secret of the kamma success? “Hard work, not remain caught up in old ways,” says Kumar. Most kammas are migrants to the coast from inland areas. They came here to seek their fortune and made the most of the opportunities available. “The reason why kammas are so enterprising is because they have traditionally been poor not rich. My own company,” Kumar says, “employs a range of castes including kapus, reddys and vaishyas.

In the port city of Vishakhapatnam, electioneering is frenzied. Vans and trucks blare out slogans. Jagadamba Junction or city center is crowded with banners and posters. Criticism of Chandrababu Naidu is loud and strong. Film editor and graphic designer Madhukar Raju, says Naidu is a media myth. E-government simply does not work. There is no manufacturing. Instead there are power cuts, farmers’ suicides and drought. As Congress steps up its campaign, Congress Lok Sabha candidate Janardana Reddy gets huge crowds in SC, ST and Christian-dominated areas like Shanthinagar.

“Chandrababu will definitely lose this election,” says Congress Rajya Sabha member T. Subbirami Reddy, “not one hundred per cent but one thousand per cent. Where is the industry in Andhra?”

Yet kamma businessman, M. Venkat Rao, who is building an extension of the Vishakhapatnam airport and providing night landing facilities says, the government’s plan is long-term infrastructural development, which will mean that every constituency will be a fight.

“The Congress is a Reddy party,” says MVVS Murthy,”Our (kamma) success stories are an important part of the TDP’s rise ever since 1993,” Murthy says. “The Reddys remain feudal landowners and dominate the Congress. No Reddy can compete with a kamma in the economy,” says Murthy.

“Dalit communities like the Madigas are now going towards the Congress alliance,” says Hyderabad-based historian Kancha Ilaiah, “leading to a drop in TDP support. In the days of NTR, the TDP was the party of the poor. But with the increasing influence of kamma finance, the TDP is being perceived as a party of the rich.”